The Russian Connection 3: Mueller is Coming

[fraurosena]

3 minutes ago, AmazonGrace said:

 

Wow, I just posted this very article in the Hope Hicks thread! 

Is this her saying "I don't have certain (damning) emails, because I was hacked, Mr. Mueller."

[fraurosena]

More info on that Seychelles meeting that Nader allegedly brokered, and Prince's involvement.

Mueller gathers evidence that 2016 Seychelles meeting was effort to establish back channel to Kremlin

Quote

Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III has gathered evidence that a secret meeting in the Seychelles just before the inauguration of Donald Trump was an effort to establish a back channel between the incoming administration and the Kremlin — apparently contradicting statements made to lawmakers by one of its participants, according to people familiar with the matter.

In January 2016, Erik Prince, the founder of the private security company Blackwater, met with a Russian official close to Russian President Vladi­mir Putin and later described the meeting to congressional investigators as a chance encounter that was not a planned discussion of U.S.-Russia relations.

A witness cooperating with Mueller has told investigators the meeting was set up in advance so that a representative of the Trump transition could meet with an emissary from Moscow to discuss future relations between the countries, according to the people familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.

George Nader, a Lebanese American business who helped organize and attended the Seychelles meeting, has testified on the matter before a grand jury gathering evidence about discussions between the Trump transition team and emissaries of the Kremlin, as part of Mueller’s investigation into Russian efforts to interfere with the 2016 election.

Nader began cooperating with Mueller after he arrived at Dulles Airport in mid-January and was stopped, served with a subpoena and questioned by the FBI, these people said. He has met numerous times with investigators.

Last year, Prince told lawmakers — and the news media — that his Seychelles meeting with Kirill Dmitriev, the head of a Russian government-controlled wealth fund, was an unplanned, unimportant encounter that came about by chance because he happened to be at a luxury hotel in the Indian Ocean island nation with officials from the United Arab Emirates.

In his statements, Prince has specifically denied reporting by The Washington Post that said the Seychelles meeting, which took place about a week before Trump’s inauguration, was described by U.S., European and Arab officials as part of an effort to establish a back-channel line of communication between Moscow and the incoming administration.

Prince told lawmakers on the House Intelligence Committee that he did not plan to meet Dmitriev in the Seychelles but that once he was there discussing possible business deals with UAE officials, they unexpectedly suggested that he visit the hotel bar and meet Dmitriev.

“At the end, one of the entourage says, ‘Hey, by the way, there’s this Russian guy that we’ve dealt with in the past. He’s here also to see someone from the Emirati delegation. And you should meet him, he’d be an interesting guy for you to know, since you’re doing a lot in the oil and gas and mineral space,’ ” Prince told lawmakers.

The two men, he said, spoke for no more than 30 minutes, or about the time it took him to drink a beer.

“We chatted on topics ranging from oil and commodity prices to how much his country wished for resumption of normal trade relations with the USA,” Prince told lawmakers. “I remember telling him that if Franklin Roosevelt could work with Josef Stalin to defeat Nazi fascism, then certainly Donald Trump could work with Vladi­mir Putin to defeat Islamic fascism.”

Prince said he went to the Seychelles as a private businessman, not as an official or unofficial emissary of the Trump transition team. During the congressional interview, which became testy at times as Democratic lawmakers pressed him to be more specific in his answers, Prince repeatedly complained that he had reason to believe U.S. intelligence agencies were leaking information about his activities.

Asked to comment on assertions that new evidence appears to contradict Prince’s description of the Seychelles meeting, a spokesman for Prince referred to his previous statements to the committee and declined further comment.

A spokesman for the special counsel declined to comment.

Prince has known Nader for years and once hired him to try to generate business from the Iraqi government in the years after the U.S. invasion of that country. That effort was not successful, according to Prince’s statements in a subsequent deposition.

Nader, according to current and former officials, was known to Trump transition and administration officials as someone with political connections in the Middle East who could help navigate the tricky diplomacy of the region.

Nader had also attended a December 2016 meeting in New York between senior Trump advisers and the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, according to a person familiar with the matter.

While Mueller is probing the circumstances of the Seychelles meeting, he is also more broadly examining apparent efforts by the Trump transition team to create a back channel for secret talks between the new administration and the Kremlin. Mueller was appointed special counsel to investigate possible Russian interference in the 2016 election, whether any Americans assisted in such efforts, and any other matters that arise in the course of his probe.

Investigators now suspect that the Seychelles meeting may have been one of the first efforts to establish such a line of communications between the two governments, these people said. Nader’s account is considered key evidence — but not the only evidence — about what transpired in the Seychelles, according to people familiar with the matter.

Nader has long served as an adviser to the UAE leadership, and in that role he met more than once with Trump officials, including Stephen K. Bannon and the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, according to people familiar with the matter. After the Seychelles meeting, Nader visited the White House several times, and met at least once there with Bannon and Kushner, these people said.

Nader could not be reached for comment, and his lawyer declined to comment.

Nader — and the Seychelles meeting — are also of interest to Mueller’s team as it examines whether any foreign money or assistance fueled the Trump campaign, and how Trump officials during the transition and early days of the administration communicated with foreign officials, particularly Russians.

Nader’s cooperation with the special counsel was first reported by the New York Times.

The UAE agreed to broker the meeting in part to explore whether Russia could be persuaded to curtail its relationship with Iran, including in Syria, a Trump administration objective. Such a concession by Moscow would have been likely to require the easing of U.S. sanctions on Russia, which were imposed for Russia’s intervention in Ukraine in 2014, those officials said.

Prince had no formal role with the Trump campaign or transition. However, according to people familiar with the Seychelles meeting, he presented himself as an unofficial envoy for Trump to high-ranking Emiratis involved in setting up his discussion with the Russian official.

 

[fraurosena]

This reeks of witness tampering.

Trump Spoke to Witnesses About Matters They Discussed With Special Counsel

Quote

The special counsel in the Russia investigation has learned of two conversations in recent months in which President Trump asked key witnesses about matters they discussed with investigators, according to three people familiar with the encounters.

In one episode, the president told an aide that the White House counsel, Donald F. McGahn II, should issue a statement denying a New York Times article in January. The article said Mr. McGahn told investigators that the president once asked him to fire the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III. Mr. McGahn never released a statement and later had to remind the president that he had indeed asked Mr. McGahn to see that Mr. Mueller was dismissed, the people said.

In the other episode, Mr. Trump asked his former chief of staff, Reince Priebus, how his interview had gone with the special counsel’s investigators and whether they had been “nice,” according to two people familiar with the discussion.

The episodes demonstrate that even as the special counsel investigation appears to be intensifying, the president has ignored his lawyers’ advice to avoid doing anything publicly or privately that could create the appearance of interfering with it.

The White House did not respond to several requests for comment. Mr. Priebus and Mr. McGahn declined to comment through their lawyer, William A. Burck.

Legal experts said Mr. Trump’s contact with the men most likely did not rise to the level of witness tampering. But witnesses and lawyers who learned about the conversations viewed them as potentially a problem and shared them with Mr. Mueller.

In investigating Russian election interference, Mr. Mueller is also examining whether the president tried to obstruct the inquiry. The former F.B.I. director James B. Comey said that Mr. Trump asked him for his loyalty and to end the investigation into his first national security adviser, Michael T. Flynn. After firing Mr. Comey, the president said privately that the dismissal had relieved “great pressure” on him. And Mr. Trump also told White House officials after Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the investigation that he needed someone running the Justice Department who would protect him.

The experts said the meetings with Mr. McGahn and Mr. Priebus would probably sharpen Mr. Mueller’s focus on the president’s interactions with other witnesses. The special counsel has questioned witnesses recently about their interactions with the president since the investigation began. The experts also said the episodes could serve as evidence for Mr. Mueller in an obstruction case.

“It makes it look like you’re cooking a story, and prosecutors are always looking out for it,” said Julie R. O’Sullivan, a law professor at Georgetown University and expert on white-collar criminal investigations.

She added, “It can get at the issue of consciousness of guilt in an obstruction case because if you didn’t do anything wrong, why are you doing that?”

Central figures in investigations are almost always advised by their own lawyers to keep from speaking with witnesses and prosecutors to prevent accusations of witness tampering. The president has not been questioned by Mr. Mueller; Mr. Trump’s lawyers are negotiating terms of a possible interview. Learning even basic details about what other witnesses told investigators could help the president shape his own answers.

Mr. Trump’s interactions with Mr. McGahn unfolded in the days after the Jan. 25 Times article, which said that Mr. McGahn threatened to quit last June after the president asked him to fire the special counsel. After the article was published, the White House staff secretary, Rob Porter, told Mr. McGahn that the president wanted him to release a statement saying that the story was not true, the people said.

Mr. Porter, who resigned last month amid a domestic abuse scandal, told Mr. McGahn the president had suggested he might “get rid of” Mr. McGahn if he chose not to challenge the article, the people briefed on the conversation said.

Mr. McGahn did not publicly deny the article, and the president later confronted him in the Oval Office in front of the White House chief of staff, John F. Kelly, according to the people.

The president said he had never ordered Mr. McGahn to fire the special counsel. Mr. McGahn replied that the president was wrong and that he had in fact asked Mr. McGahn in June to call the deputy attorney general, Rod J. Rosenstein, to tell him that the special counsel had a series of conflicts that disqualified him for overseeing the investigation and that he had to be dismissed. The president told Mr. McGahn that he did not remember the discussion that way.

Mr. Trump moved on, pointing out that Mr. McGahn had never told him that he was going to resign over the order to fire the special counsel. Mr. McGahn acknowledged that that was true but said that he had told senior White House officials at the time that he was going to quit.

It is not clear how the confrontation was resolved. Mr. McGahn has stayed on as White House counsel, one of the few senior administration officials who has been with the president since the campaign.

Mr. Priebus met with the president in the West Wing in December, according to the people with knowledge of their encounter. Allies of Mr. Priebus, who was fired by Mr. Trump in July, have cautioned him to keep his distance. But Mr. Priebus, who is seeking to build a law practice as a Washington power broker who can open doors for clients, has maintained contact and occasionally visited the White House to see Mr. Trump and his own replacement, Mr. Kelly.

Mr. Trump brought up Mr. Priebus’s October interview with the special counsel’s office, the people said, and Mr. Priebus replied that the investigators were courteous and professional. He shared no specifics and did not say what he had told investigators, and the conversation moved on after a few minutes, those briefed on it said. Mr. Kelly was present for that conversation as well, and it was not clear whether he tried to stop the discussion.

It is not illegal for the subject of an investigation to learn what witnesses have told investigators. But that is usually done through lawyers for the people involved because their communications are often shielded from prosecutors because of attorney-client privilege. In organized crime and complex white-collar investigations, prosecutors often ask witnesses whether they have spoken to the person under investigation to determine whether they are coordinating their stories.

Mr. Priebus has had a long and complicated relationship with the president. He was one of the few who publicly defended Mr. Trump after the Times article about his attempt to fire Mr. Mueller, which cited the president’s view that Mr. Mueller had too many conflicts to be the special counsel.

“He expresses concerns with the conflicts, but I never heard the idea or the concept that this person needed to be fired,” Mr. Priebus said last month in an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “I never felt it was relayed to me that way, either. And I would know the difference between a level 10 situation as reported in that story and what was reality. And it just — to me, it wasn’t reality.”

 

[fraurosena]

This could be a coincidence, but if not... it's bad. Real bad.

 

[GreyhoundFan]

"What we believe Mueller is investigating"

Spoiler

Deputy Attorney General Rod J. Rosenstein’s order appointing Robert S. Mueller III to serve as special counsel outlined what Mueller and his team would be investigating.

The Special Counsel is authorized to conduct the investigation confirmed by then-FBI Director James B. Comey in testimony before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on March 20, 2017, including:
(i) any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump; and
(ii) any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation; and
(iii) any other matters within the scope of 28 C.F.R. § 600.4(a).

The referenced part of the Code of Federal Regulations, 28 C.F.R. § 600.4(a), allows the special counsel to “investigate and prosecute federal crimes committed in the course of, and with intent to interfere with, the Special Counsel’s investigation, such as perjury, obstruction of justice, destruction of evidence, and intimidation of witnesses.”

Mueller is often described as having been appointed to investigate possible collusion between the campaign of President Trump and Russian actors, but it’s clearly broader than that. And, as time has passed, some specifics have emerged about what Mueller and his team are investigating, and we have increasingly learned about areas into which that investigation may have expanded.

Below, our analysis of what Mueller’s team is believed to be investigating.

Russian efforts to interfere in the 2016 election. This was part of what then-FBI Director James B. Comey originally confirmed during his March 2017 testimony. But, more specifically, it is also an area in which Mueller’s team has already issued indictments. Last month, 13 individuals affiliated with an agency in Russia were indicted for creating fake social media personas to promote divisive public events or share political material online. The charges included conspiracy and identity theft. (Part of the latter allegation involved buying bank account numbers that appear to have been provided by a California man named Richard Pinedo, who pleaded guilty to identity theft charges in February.)

Those indictments also make up the bulk of the outstanding cases brought by Mueller’s team.

... < nice graphic of the indictments >

What may be in the pipeline: What has not been addressed publicly in indictments is Russia’s alleged hacks of the Democratic National Committee network and the email account of Hillary Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta. Those hacks were almost certainly more significant in affecting the 2016 election. The outstanding questions involve the actors behind those hacks (believed to be arms of Russian intelligence) and how the stolen information ended up in the hands of WikiLeaks, which published it.

Possible efforts by the Trump campaign to aid the Russian interference. This is generally understood to be the heart of Mueller’s investigation. So far, the indictment getting at this point most directly is George Papadopoulos’s guilty plea unveiled last October. Papadopoulos is the campaign adviser who was informed that the Russians had “dirt” on Clinton in the form of emails in April 2016. He inadvertently kicked off the FBI’s counterintelligence investigation — made public by Comey in March of last year — by telling an Australian diplomat what he had learned. When emails stolen from the DNC were released beginning in July, the Australian government informed the FBI about Papadopoulos’s comments.

Papadopoulos pleaded guilty to lying to federal investigators about when he met the London-based professor who told him about the “dirt” and lying about when he learned about those documents. He is believed to be assisting Mueller’s investigation.

What may be in the pipeline: What constitutes “collusion” is subjective; there’s no criminal statute detailing what would qualify. In other words, there’s some subjectivity in consideration of whether Papadopoulos’s failure to inform American authorities about what he’d learned counts as collusion. Was he too distant from the core of the campaign? Was his inaction a tacit form of collusion?

We know of other possible points of interaction that might be similarly nebulous. Does Donald Trump Jr.’s embrace of a meeting at Trump Tower predicated on getting “dirt” on Clinton qualify? Was campaign adviser Carter Page told about the existence of incriminating information while in Russia, as alleged by the dossier compiled by former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele? Were there contacts between the campaign and WikiLeaks beyond the ones that have been made public? Do those count? Is there more to any of those stories that we don’t yet know about? Are there connections which aren’t yet public at all?

More to the point, are there criminal charges that would result from these actions? At the blog Lawfare, writers Emma Kohse and Benjamin Wittes (the latter an associate of Comey’s) argue that the indictment against the Russians shows how charges might be brought against campaign staffers. In short, the charge could be “conspiracy to defraud the United States.”

“Unlike conspiracy to commit an offense, conspiracy to defraud the United States need not be connected to a specific underlying crime,” they write, “and ‘defraud’ is not defined. In the 1910 case Haas v. Henkel, the Supreme Court interpreted the provision broadly to include ‘any conspiracy for the purpose of impairing, obstructing, or defeating the lawful function of any department of government.’ Notably, there is no requirement that the government be cheated out of money or property.”

Obstruction of Mueller’s investigation. This is where that 28 C.F.R. § 600.4(a) bullet point comes into play.

There are numerous reports that Mueller’s team is building a case against Trump and possibly others for attempts to interfere with his investigation or, more broadly, the investigation into his campaign. Those may include:

• The firing of Comey, which he later told NBC’s Lester Holt was a function of the Russia investigation.
• Apparent efforts to get Comey to drop his investigation into former national security adviser Michael Flynn. (Flynn eventually pleaded guilty to charges of lying to federal authorities.) This effort apparently included asking other administration officials to intervene with Comey.
• Trump pressuring Attorney General Jeff Sessions to quit, allowing him to appoint a replacement who might handcuff Mueller’s investigation. This after Trump encouraged Sessions not to recuse himself from matters related to the Russia investigation.
• Trump’s team drafting an intentionally misleading public statement after the Trump Tower meeting was revealed. This may include then-communications director Hope Hicks allegedly telling someone on Trump’s legal team that emails contradicting the statement would “never get out.” (Through an attorney, Hicks denied this.)

It’s not clear if Mueller could charge Trump with obstruction of justice, given that he is president. Others might not be so lucky.

Financial crimes uncovered through the investigation. That “any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation” stipulation in Rosenstein’s original order has been the bane of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort’s recent existence.

Manafort faces more than two dozen charges ranging from fraud to conspiracy to money laundering, a function of his work prior to starting with the Trump campaign. His longtime business partner Rick Gates, who served as deputy campaign chairman, faced a similar raft of charges but accepted a plea deal last month in exchange for cooperating with Mueller’s team. A London-based lawyer also pleaded guilty to charges from Mueller’s team related to communications with Gates.

What may be in the pipeline: One of the likely worries of those affiliated with Trump’s campaign is that they, too, may have unrelated financial tricks that get caught up by Mueller’s team. Trump himself once said that he considered investigations into his own finances a “red line” that Mueller should not cross. The Post reported on Tuesday that Mueller’s team was investigating incidents involving Trump’s private lawyer, Michael Cohen. Shortly before presidential primary voting began in 2016, Cohen reached out to an aide of Russian President Vladimir Putin to ask for help advancing a development project that the Trump Organization was hoping to build in Moscow.

There have been sporadic questions as well about loans received by Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner.

Other foreign money used to influence the election or administration policy. George Nader, a businessman with ties to the United Arab Emirates, is apparently cooperating with Mueller’s team. Nader allegedly attended a meeting in January 2017 in the Seychelles during which an official close to Putin met with Erik Prince, a Trump ally and the brother of education secretary Betsy DeVos.

That meeting could illuminate the relationship between Trump’s team and the Russian government, as the meeting may have also included an attempt to establish a private communications channel between Trump’s team and the Russians. (Kushner allegedly worked to set up something similar in a meeting with the Russian ambassador the month prior.)

But the New York Times also suggests that Mueller’s interest in Nader may be broader than that Seychelles meeting.

“Investigators have questioned Mr. Nader and have pressed witnesses for information about any possible attempts by the Emiratis to buy political influence by directing money to support Mr. Trump during the presidential campaign, according to people with knowledge of the discussions,” the newspaper reported last week.

NBC reported that Mueller has also questioned witnesses about whether Kushner’s efforts to secure loans for his private business ventures might have shaped White House policy once Trump was inaugurated. That includes conversations with Qatar, Turkey, Russia, China and the UAE. (Last month The Post reported that several countries, including the UAE and China, had discussed leveraging Kushner’s inexperience and private business to their benefit.)

Lying to federal officials. Hanging over all of these questions is Mueller’s trump card, if you will. If anyone being interviewed by Mueller’s team or by federal agents is found to have lied, they can be charged with a felony. So far, Mueller’s team has secured guilty pleas from four people for misleading federal authorities: Flynn, Papadopoulos, Gates and the lawyer linked to Gates, Alex van der Zwaan. As Mueller continues to interview witnesses, more opportunities arise for people to lie about what they know.

If they do, Mueller has shown willingness to exact a price.

What may be in the pipeline: Almost anything.

 

[Botkinetti]

When I think about the investigation I find myself hoping that the agents ( tens ? / dozens ? / hundreds ? ) enjoy puzzles. I hope they like fitting pieces of information together and pulling at seemingly disparate threads to form a coherent whole.  I also hope they are dismayed at the erosion of democracy and the rule of law in their country and are therefore crossing every  t and dotting every i . I want them to bring down this presidency.

[fraurosena]

This happened during the night. 

Secret Service and ambulance descend on Russian Embassy in Washington DC

Quote

In the midst of a week which has seen a heightened Trump-Russia investigation and the apparent poisoning of Russian nationals in the United Kingdom, something very strange is now going on tonight at the Russian Embassy in Washington DC. Whatever is playing out, it involves the Secret Service, CSI personnel, and emergency medical professionals, and it’s happening in the middle of the night.

Filmmaker Ford Fischer captured video footage of the various personnel surrounding the Russian Embassy on Wisconsin Avenue, located about four miles from the White House. Fischer posted this along with his video: “Secret Service and CSI / MPD are outside Russian Embassy on Wisconsin Avenue. Reason unclear. Ambulance was present but left before I began filming.” So what’s going on here?

Frankly, we have no idea. The presence of just the Secret Service could point to a mere visit to the Embassy by someone who is under routine protection. The presence of just an ambulance could point to a mere medical malady. But combine the two, along with crime scene investigators, and it appears that something much more has happened here. This week Russian President Vladimir Putin appeared to resume targeting Russian nationals whom he sees as a threat, after several suspicious Russian deaths took place earlier in the Trump-Russia scandal. You can watch Fischer’s video of the Russian Embassy incident here:

Robert Mueller recently indicted thirteen Russian nationals for having conspired to rig the election in Donald Trump’s favor, though none of those Russian nationals are believed to be in the United States.

I wonder if we'll ever find out what this was about. 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[Howl]

14 hours ago, fraurosena said:

This could be a coincidence, but if not... it's bad. Real bad.

 

Holy crap! Yes, I think it's a "coincidence" -- a little valentine from Putin to anyone who thinks they can f*ck with him and survive and by extension, this includes anyone in the US who has been compromised by the Russians.  This was done in a crowded, public area in broad daylight.  Doesn't the UK have CCTV everywhere?

Was this similar to nerve agent VX that  was used to assasinate Kim Jong Un's step brother? 

I sincerely hope he and his daughters survive.  

[AmazonGrace]

 

[AmazonGrace]

 

[fraurosena]

Right now, Sam Nunberg is testifying to the Grand Jury. Oh, to be a fly on that wall! 

Will he be pleading the fifth, or will he be forthcoming with everything they want to know? 

[AnywhereButHere]

1 minute ago, fraurosena said:

Right now, Sam Nunberg is testifying to the Grand Jury. Oh, to be a fly on that wall! 

Will he be pleading the fifth, or will he be forthcoming with everything they want to know? 

I'm not entirely sure he could stop talking if he wanted to. The hinge on his mouth is stuck on "open" and the filter from his brain seems to have rusted out a while ago.

How much sense he makes may depend on how liquid his breakfast was...

[Howl]

1 hour ago, AnywhereButHere said:

How much sense he makes may depend on how liquid his breakfast was...

He may need a LOT of liquid courage if he's committed to telling the truth.  Remember, Nunberg claims that Mueller offered him immunity, but we don't know 1) if that offer was really made and 2) if the offer was made, did he accept it?  If the offer was tendered, I think Nunberg would accept, because he's the kind of guy who would save his own hide, and throw his mentors under the bus.  This might be why he got drunk and went around claiming that he would never, ever ever do such a thing. 

[GreyhoundFan]

5 hours ago, fraurosena said:

Will he be pleading the fifth, or will he be forthcoming with everything they want to know? 

I'm guessing he will be pleading FOR a fifth...a fifth of Jack Daniels.

[onekidanddone]

1 hour ago, GreyhoundFan said:

I'm guessing he will be pleading FOR a fifth...a fifth of Jack Daniels.

Or is that a fifth of Stomy Daniels? 

[Howl]

On 3/9/2018 at 9:56 AM, AnywhereButHere said:

I'm not entirely sure he could stop talking if he wanted to. The hinge on his mouth is stuck on "open" and the filter from his brain seems to have rusted out a while ago.

So true.  Now Sam's all like (my interpretation), "Yes, yes, I did it, it was cool. I was awesome. I never did anything incriminating so no problems for me, you can count on that.  But Roger Stone?  Whooo, boy. Roger.  Roger's in trouble. And the investigation?  Dude, seriously, it's waay important, like, soooo important." 

Or you can read a much more nuanced report here from ABC news: 

Former Trump aide speaks to Mueller, believes Russia probe is 'not a witch hunt'

[fraurosena]

Sweet Rufus, this is so fucked up I have no words.

Putin: Jews, Ukrainians 'with Russian citizenship' could be behind US election meddling

Quote

Russian President Vladimir Putin suggested in a new interview that people with different ethnicities who hold Russian citizenship could be behind interference in the 2016 U.S. election.

Putin told NBC News in an interview that the U.S. was refusing to work with Russia on cybersecurity and “instead throws 13 Russians to the media.”

“Maybe they are not even Russians, but Ukrainians, Tatars or Jews, but with Russian citizenship, which should also be checked,” Putin said. “Maybe they have dual citizenship or a green card, maybe the U.S. paid them for this. How can you know that? I do not know, either,” he added.

Israeli lawmaker Ksenia Svetlova quickly called on Israel to condemn Putin’s “harsh” comments, saying that "if Israel does not defend the Jewish people, no one will, according to Haaretz.

"Maybe the Jews meddled in the U.S. elections. Maybe the Jews rule the world, maybe the Jews slaughtered Jews in Poland – all of these claims have one root cause – a hatred of Jews," Svetlova said.

Putin said during the interview that he “couldn’t care less” if Russians had interfered in the U.S. election, claiming those indicted by special counsel Robert Mueller weren’t connected to the Kremlin.

"So what if they're Russians?" Putin said. "There are 146 million Russians. So what? ... I don't care. I couldn't care less ... They do not represent the interests of the Russian state."

Mueller last month brought charges against 13 Russian nationals and three Russian groups for interfering in the 2016 election, which represented the first charges related to Russia's election meddling as part of the probe.

 

[fraurosena]

Lordy, they have it on tape! 

Trump Spoke to a Russian Activist About Ending Sanctions—Just Weeks After Launching His Campaign

[Youtube video in question included in quote]

Quote

While researching the strange story of two Russian gun aficionados who cultivated Donald Trump’s presidential campaign via the National Rifle Association, we came across a little-noticed but noteworthy episode concerning Trump and US sanctions against Russia. Sanctions have been a source of extraordinary conflict between the president and Congress and a matter of clear significance to special counsel Robert Mueller’s ongoing investigation.

Just a month after Trump announced his campaign for the White House, he spoke directly to Maria Butina, the protégé of the powerful Russian banking official and Putin ally Alexander Torshin. During a public question and answer session at FreedomFest, a libertarian convention in Las Vegas in July 2015, Butina asked Trump what he would do as president about “damaging” US sanctions. Trump suggested he would get rid of them.

“I am visiting from Russia,” Butina said into the mic.

“Ahhhhh, Putin!” Trump interjected, prompting laughter from the audience as he added a mocking riff about the current president: “Good friend of Obama, Putin. He likes Obama a lot. Go ahead.”

“My question will be about foreign politics,” Butina continued. “If you will be elected as president, what will be your foreign politics especially in the relationships with my country? And do you want to continue the politics of sanctions that are damaging of both economy [sic]? Or you have any other ideas?”

After going off on Obama and digressing into trade policy, Trump responded: “I know Putin, and I’ll tell you what, we get along with Putin… I believe I would get along very nicely with Putin, OK? And I mean, where we have the strength. I don’t think you’d need the sanctions. I think we would get along very, very well.”

Trump did not appear to know who Butina was. But Torshin claims to have met Trump three months prior and had a “jovial exchange” with him at the NRA annual convention in Nashville, Tennessee.

Here’s a video of the exchange between Trump and Butina, which was posted at the time by a group calling itself LetsTalkNevada:

It’s long been clear that the Trump campaign wanted to ease up on the Kremlin and went to great lengths to covertly pursue that goal, from ex-national security adviser Michael Flynn’s lies to the FBI about discussing sanctions with the Russian ambassador, to the cover-up of the now infamous June 2016 Trump Tower meeting supposedly about “adoptions.” Among the major remaining questions today is whether Trump’s posture toward Putin has been financially motivated—or what else may lie behind his bizarrely favorable treatment of the Russian dictator that we don’t yet know about.

 

[Howl]

Just curious: has there been any movement on applying sanctions or is Trump still have that on the back burner?

[AmazonGrace]

 

[fraurosena]

Felix Sater is one shady customer. He's an opportunistic hustler and wheeler dealer. But it turns out he's also been an (unpaid) FBI/CIA asset for decades. And he's cooperating with Mueller.

Although this article is an interesting read (and I heartily recommend reading all of it) it is much too long to quote in its entirety, so I'm only quoting the end part where the Russian connection is discussed.

Quote

[...]

When Trump won the presidency, Sater saw an opportunity to do what he does best: make deals. But his ambition backfired, putting Sater in the middle of the Trump-Russia scandal.

In early 2017, Sater told BuzzFeed News he was trying to close a deal with a Ukrainian politician and others on an energy deal in Eastern Europe. Sater estimated he and his partners could earn billions. But as they closed in, the Ukrainian, Andrey Artemenko, asked Sater for a favor: Could he broker a meeting with Trump’s team to discuss a “peace plan” for Ukraine and Russia?

The deal, which Sater said set out a way to lift sanctions on Russia, surely would have pleased the Kremlin, but it would have been a sharp departure from previous US policy. Still, Sater summoned Trump’s personal lawyer, Cohen, to a Midtown Manhattan hotel in February 2017, and Artemenko gave him a letter about the plan. Cohen has denied passing the plan to the White House and told BuzzFeed News he threw it out.

Where some see the meeting as foreign interference in US policy, Sater sees opportunity. If he could grease the skids with a potential business partner while bringing peace to a war-torn region, Sater said, who could argue with that? “No more war,” Sater said. “People not getting killed. Beautiful situation.”

But the encounter is now reportedly part of the special counsel’s investigation, and Sater finds himself in the spotlight. Of the Ukrainian plan, Sater said, “I thought everybody wins. Turns out, I lost.”

Sater has already been summoned by congressional investigators, and he is expected to speak to the Senate Intelligence Committee in April. He also has been questioned by Mueller’s team, several of whom he knows from his past undercover work. It’s almost certain that Sater has sensitive information about Trump’s business dealings, but he won’t say what he was asked or what information he provided. The special counsel’s office declined to comment for this story.

The glare of the Trump-Russia investigation, he said, has taken its toll: His marriage of 29 years collapsed, his reputation is mud among his business friends, and he has recently been the subject of anti-Semitic messages and phone calls from neo-Nazi groups.

He hopes that by revealing the extent of his cooperation, he will be able to change how the public — and his own family — thinks about him. Meanwhile, he presses on without the support of Trump, whom Sater said he considered a good friend.

Trump has denied knowing the man who had an office three doors down from his own and who helped his company explore deals across the globe. In a 2013 deposition, Trump said of Sater, “If he were sitting in the room right now, I really wouldn’t know what he looked like.”

Over dinner last week at the Beverly Hills Hotel, Sater was clearly hurt when he spoke about the president’s statement. “It’s very upsetting but, you know, what am I going to do?” Sater said. “Start calling him a liar?” Sater said he hasn’t talked with Trump in a couple of years, but he sees an angle to keeping in Trump’s good graces.

“First thing I plan to do when Trump leaves office, whether it's next week, in 2020 or four years later, is march right into his office and say, ‘Let's build Trump Moscow.’

“I'm serious.” 

 

[fraurosena]

7 hours ago, Howl said:

Just curious: has there been any movement on applying sanctions or is Trump still have that on the back burner?

In a word: nope. 

I don't think any sanctions on Russia will be implemented as long as the presidunce is in the WH and the Repugliklans have the majority on the Hill.

[fraurosena]

The Repugliklans are shutting down the House Russia Probe. What a surprise! NOT.

House Intelligence Panel Wraps Up Russia Probe Interviews

Quote

The House Intelligence Committee has finished interviewing witnesses in its yearlong probe into Russian interference in the 2016 election, according to a person familiar with the matter, signaling the end is near of a contentious investigation that has revealed deep partisan divisions on the panel.

The Republican-run committee is now preparing to write a report based on the testimony of dozens of witnesses and thousands of pages of documents. Republicans and Democrats on the panel are unlikely to come to a bipartisan conclusion on some of the central questions in the probe, including whether anyone from President Donald Trump’s campaign worked with Russians to help tip the election in his favor, according to interviews with multiple lawmakers and aides on both sides.

The panel has interviewed more than 50 individuals, the last of whom was Corey Lewandowski, the former manager of Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign, who testified last week. The panel didn’t interview the president, but it did call many of his closest aides and confidants over the course of the investigation, including his son-in-law Jared Kushner, his son Donald Trump Jr. and his former senior strategist Steve Bannon.

Republicans on the committee and in the full House of Representatives are eager to put the Capitol Hill investigations to rest, according to people familiar with the matter, citing the coming midterm election season.

“We have not been informed that there will not be any more interviews conducted; we have also not been informed that the investigation has ended,” a senior Democratic aide on the committee said.

A Senate panel, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, is conducting a similar investigation. Both are aimed at establishing public accountability.

Separately, special counsel Robert Mueller is conducting a criminal investigation into Russian interference and any ties to Trump associates in that effort, as well as other matters. That Mueller probe has returned several indictments of former Trump associates.

The aim of both the House and Senate probes has been to examine further a January 2017 conclusion from the U.S. intelligence community that the highest levels of the Russian government were involved in directing the electoral interference to boost Mr. Trump at the expense of his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton. Russia’s tactics included efforts to hack state election systems; infiltrating and leaking information from party committees and political strategists; and disseminating through social media and other outlets negative stories about Mrs. Clinton and positive ones about Mr. Trump, the report said.

Mr. Trump has denied any collusion between his campaign and Russia, and Moscow has repeatedly denied any government effort to influence the U.S. election. Three Russian companies and 13 Russian citizens were indicted last month on charges of engaging in a widespread effort to interfere in the 2016 presidential election.

Since last year, Democrats on the House committee have said they are unhappy with what they deem a lack of thoroughness in the GOP-run investigation. They have said that the committee has allowed a number of key witnesses to refuse to answer questions and that Republicans appear unwilling to use tools available to Congress to force answers.

“Witnesses do not get to pick and choose when it comes to very relevant testimony to our investigation,” Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the top Democrat on the panel, told reporters last week.

In late February, Democrats publicly identified six individuals to whom they wanted to issue subpoenas, as well as several topic areas they thought warranted additional inquiry. They were rebuffed by the Republican leaders on the committee.

The chairman of the committee, Rep. Devin Nunes (R., Calif.), temporarily stepped aside from leading the Russia investigation last year after he was accused of mishandling classified information.

In March 2017, he said at a news conferences on Capitol Hill that secret documents he had viewed confirmed U.S. intelligence officials had collected information about Trump transition aides while spying on foreign officials, and had improperly disseminated details about the Americans.

It was later revealed that Mr. Nunes got that information from the White House.

Texas Republican Rep. Mike Conaway took the reins of the probe last April. An ethics investigation later cleared Mr. Nunes of any wrongdoing in his handling of classified information, but he has largely allowed Mr. Conaway to finish the investigation.

Mr. Nunes, however, was the driving force behind the release of a GOP memo accusing law-enforcement officials of improperly handling surveillance of a onetime Trump campaign adviser who was suspected for a time of being a Russian agent. The memo was released over the objections of federal law-enforcement officials and Democrats on the committee, who said it was misleading and incomplete.

Democrats then released a rebuttal that defended investigators’ handling of the surveillance.

The Senate panel has functioned with more bipartisan cooperation and is also in the writing stage of its own reports on Russia.

The Senate panel’s first product is expected to be an election security report for state and local governments, to be released in coming weeks. The lead authors on that report are a bipartisan duo, Republican James Lankford of Oklahoma and Democrat Kamala Harris of California. The Senate panel expects to produce additional reports on social media, potential collusion and other topics related to the investigation.