In July, William Browder spoke in front of a Senate Committee in order to explain why and what Vladimir Putin’s motivations have been over the past few years, illuminating his interest in the Donald Trump presidential campaign. The reason was the Magnitsky Act, named after a former attorney for Browder, who died mysteriously in a Russian prison after trying to help uncover some of the profound financial corruption perpetrated by the kleptocracy Putin runs in Russia.
Browder: Vladimir Putin, I believe him to be the richest man in the world, I believe him to be worth 200 billion dollars. That money is held in banks all over the world, in America and all over. The purpose of Putin’s regime has been to commit terrible crimes in order to get that money, and he doesn’t want to lose that money by having it frozen. So he personally is at risk of the Magnitsky Act. It’s a very personal, venal issue which is why, the first reason, why he’s so upset.
The second reason is that in order to get that $200 billion, he has had to instruct a lot of people working for him—let’s say ten thousand people working for him—to do terrible things: to arrest, kidnap, torture, and kill to take people's properties away. And as a result, the only way to get people to do such terrible things, is to say, if you do these terrible things, there will be no consequence. You will enjoy absolute impunity.
As a result of the Magnitsky Act, he can no longer guarantee absolute impunity, because all-of-a-sudden, we have created consequences in the West. I would not understate the value of the Magnitsky Act in terms of the consequences, because not only does it freeze the assets that are held in America, but the moment you get put on the Magnitsky List, you get put on the OFAC Sanctions List—which is a Treasury sanctions list. No bank in the world wants to be in violation of Treasury sanctions. And therefore, any bank, even if it is in South Korea or Dubai, if they see somebody on the Treasury sanctions list, [they] will close their account that day. And as a result, you basically become a financial pariah, and so it’s a real consequence.
The first thing Vladimir Putin did after the passing of the Magnitsky Act was to ban US adoption of Russian children. This is why, when Donald Trump Jr. talks about speaking with Russian intelligence adoption lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya, they aren’t talking about adoption. On Sunday, Browder tweeted about how, after a fourth time, Vladimir Putin’s harassment techniques of trying to get him put on Interpol—to limit his ability to travel and spread the word—seems to have found some purchase with the United States government.
That is fascism. There is no other word for it. Go over to this community diary for more discussion.