In this weekly update in Trump Russia Corruption Timeline the most interesting revelations may have again come from Stormy Daniel’s attorney Michael Avenatti who early in the week revealed that Trump’s personal attorney Michael Cohen had secured $Millions in a consulting contracts from various companies that all were under threat by Trump Admin policies including AT&T who were attempting to cement a merger with Time-Warner which Trump and his DOJ opposed, Swiss pharmaceutical company Novartis who were challenged by Trump’s call to cut drug prices, and Korea Aerospace industries who have a pending contract to make jet trainers for the USAF.
Among those shoveling money at Cohen to perhaps lobby or reveal insights that would help them deal with Trump was an investment company Columbus Nova which is the American arm of a Russian firm called Renova which is owned by Oligarch Victor Vekselberg who of course has ties to Vladimir Putin, as well as business ties to Oleg Deripaska’s company Rusal and also Oligarch German Khan who is the father-in-law of Alex Van der Zwaan the first person to go to prison in the Mueller probe for lying to the FBI. Vekselberg who is now sanctioned by the Treasury Dept. as a result of the Russia annexation of Crimea, and has been represented by one of Trump’s attorneys Marc Kasowitz had attended the RT anniversary dinner in 2015 along wih Michael Flynn and Jill Stein, had donated $285,000 to Trump's inauguration fund and also attended the inauguration where he met personally with — you guessed it — Michael Cohen. In April Mueller’s investigators questioned Vekselberg about his connections to Cohen at a NY airport and have been talking to all the companies that gave Cohen money — and even some were solicited by Cohen such as Uber and Ford that didn’t bite — since November.
Like a pack of roaches scrambling when the lights go on Columbus Nova has been frantically denying it’s links to Renova and Vekselberg, scrubbing any references to them from their site although Vekselberg’s cousin Andrew Intratar is their CEO, had himself donated $250,000 to Trump’s inauguration fund and had paid for Vekselberg’s ticket to attend. AT&T has said paying Cohen was a “big mistake” and Novartis has said that Cohen “didn’t do any real work” for them even though they paid him 4 times what they normally pay their lobbyists and they did get a lunch meeting with Trump out of it, meanwhile Cohen didn’t register as a lobbyist or a foreign agent.
However large that bombshell has been, there may actually be an even bigger thermo-grenade that Avenatti just lobbed at the Trump administration and is ticking down to it’s final detonation. involving bribes being paid to Michael Flynn by “spies” from Qatar
It began with these tweets.
What’s this mean? Well...
Mother Jones has since identified the men in the tweet as a group from Qatar, including Ahmed al-Rumaihi. In late 2016 and 2017, al-Rumaihi worked to try and build relationships with those inside the newly elected administration. Al-Rumaihi, a former diplomat, currently heads a division under Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund. In a recent lawsuit, they were accused of attempting to bribe officials in the Trump administration, though an associate at a firm representing a defendant called it a “defamation suit.”
In an even more bizarre twist, last week, rapper and actor Ice Cube filed a $1.2 billion lawsuit along with his business partner Jeff Kwatinetz claiming Qatari officials as well as Al-Rumaihi attempted to use funds in a basketball league to score access to Trump officials, including Steve Bannon.
“Mr Al-Rumaihi requested I set up a meeting between him, the Qatari government, and Stephen Bannon, and to tell Steve Bannon that Qatar would underwrite all of his political efforts in return for his support,” said Kwatinetz, according to court filings Mother Jones cited.
So this is a little muddy but apparently this may have something to do with the fact that Qatar has been in the barrel with the Trump administration ever since Jared Kushner’s dad Charles asked them for a loan to help their flagging property at 666 Park Ave, and they said “heck no.”
The real estate firm tied to the family of presidential son-in-law and top White House adviser Jared Kushner made a direct pitch to Qatar’s minister of finance in April 2017 in an attempt to secure investment in a critically distressed asset in the company’s portfolio, according to two sources. At the previously unreported meeting, Jared Kushner’s father Charles, who runs Kushner Companies, and Qatari Finance Minister Ali Sharif Al Emadi discussed financing for the Kushners’ signature 666 Fifth Avenue property in New York City.
The 30-minute meeting, according to two sources in the financial industry who asked not to be named because of the sensitivity of the potential transaction, included aides to both parties, and was held at a suite at the St. Regis Hotel in New York.
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The failure to broker the deal would be followed only a month later by a Middle Eastern diplomatic row in which Jared Kushner provided critical support to Qatar’s neighbors. Led by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, a group of Middle Eastern countries, with Kushner’s backing, led a diplomatic assault that culminated in a blockade of Qatar. Kushner, according to reports at the time, subsequently undermined efforts by Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to bring an end to the standoff.
This in the pay-to-play business — or your basic protection racket — is known as a “shake down.” You pay us now in cash, or you pay us later in something else. a bit more messy. The odd part is that the U.S. has a major military base in Qatar and they’ve been a close ally in fighting ISIS, however pretty much overnight they turned into “terrorism buddy #1.”
The ambitious Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, in concert with his counterpart in Abu Dhabi, Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, chose instead to escalate the feud into another crisis that the Middle East does not need.Among their initial demands were that Qatar close Al Jazeera; scale back co-operation with Iran, with which Qatar shares its gas; evict a Turkish military base; and sever ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. They also required the emirate to submit to regular compliance checks.
This allegations of Qatar being linked to Iran and ISIS appears to be a hoax generated by Russian hackers.
Russian hackers planted a fake news report on Qatar’s state news site that contributed to the breakdown of diplomatic ties among several Gulf states, CNN reported on Tuesday evening.
CNN reported, citing unnamed U.S. officials briefed on the investigation, that the Qatari government reported the breach two weeks ago. The false report in question “attributed false remarks to the nation’s ruler that appeared friendly to Iran and Israel and questioned whether President Donald Trump would last in office,” the Qatari government said, according to the report.
U.S. officials told CNN that the goal of the breach was apparently to “cause rifts among the U.S. and its allies” and said it was unclear whether the hackers were those responsible for attempted interference in the 2016 election.
So on the basis of this and after they denied a loan to the Kushners Qatar has been blockaded by the UAE and Saudis for months and the Trump Administration has until recently completely backed that blockade even though it makes no sense.
The Saudi Crown prince (MBS) has had meetings with the Trump campaign even during the transition with Don Jr. and reps of the Crown Prince of the UAE — Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nayhan — who had also secretly met with Kushner and Steve Bannon at Trump Tower which had raised alarms in the intel community because al-Nayhan didn’t alert State officials of his intention to visit. That meeting had occurred on December 13th, exactly one day after the Qatar delegation was escorted into Trump Tower by Michael Cohen.
The two princes have actually feuded over which of them has more influence over Kushner.
The mysterious Trumpworld fixer George Nader, who was turned cooperating witness in the Mueller investigation earlier this year, was the subject of another strange chapter on Wednesday evening in The New York Times, which reveals how Nader allegedly worked with a key Republican National Committee official to ferry Saudi and Emirati influence into the White House. Robert Mueller, as we know, has been examining the influence of foreign money on the Trump campaign and administration—an investigation that led him to Nader, a well-known, if somewhat fringe figure in some Washington circles, who currently serves as an adviser to Emirati Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan, and who was involved in coordinating a pre-inaugural meeting between representatives for the U.A.E., Trump emissary Erik Prince, and a Russian investor with close ties to Vladimir Putin. (Prince has said the meeting was serendipitous and that he was not representing Trump.) Nader, who has taken an immunity deal with Mueller, also attended a separate December 2016 Trump Tower meeting with the crown prince, Jared Kushner, and former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon.
As the Times reports, Nader’s reach also extended into the White House after the inauguration. According to hundreds of pages of leaked documents, Nader sought to cultivate Elliott Broidy, the deputy finance chairman of the R.N.C., to help him influence the Trump White House on behalf of the rulers of Saudi Arabia and the U.A.E. On his to-do list was encouraging the ouster of Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, who had butted heads with Kushner over the Gulf nations’ blockade of Qatar before his summary dismissal earlier this month.
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The possibility that Nader and Broidy were working in concert to push the Trump administration toward policies favored by the Saudis and Emiratis comes as Kushner’s ties to the Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman are also under scrutiny. Since Trump ascended to the Oval Office, Kushner has worked to forge a strong relationship with Prince Mohammed, ostensibly as the two pursue their shared goal of ending the Israel-Palestine conflict. On Wednesday, the Intercept reported that the Saudi prince bragged about his ties to Kushner and claimed that he has the president’s son-in-law “in his pocket.” The two are said to have grown close during Trump’s inaugural overseas trip to Saudi Arabia; when Kushner took another, unannounced trip to Riyadh in October, they reportedly “stayed up until nearly 4 A.M. several nights, swapping stories and planning strategy.” According to sources who spoke to the Intercept, Prince Mohammed told confidants that while he was in Riyadh, Kushner—whose access to classified briefings was recently revoked by White House Chief of Staff John Kelly—provided him a list of names of individuals that were disloyal to him, cribbed from the President’s Daily Brief. (A representative for Kushner denied this, calling the story “so obviously false and ridiculous” that it “merit[ed] no response.”) A week later, Prince Mohammed led what he characterized as an anti-corruption crackdown, in which the Saudi government arrested and imprisoned dozens of members of the Saudi royal family, several of whom were reportedly listed in the Daily Brief. (The Saudi Embassy did not respond to a request for comment from the Intercept.)
Hm... Treason much?
So this explains why Kushner worked around Tillerson to support the Qatar blockade which made the two crown princes happy. But Qatar hasn’t been sitting back, they’ve been seeking to find their own buddies with links to the Trump administration apparently starting with convicted former NSA director Michael Flynn in their effort to reach out to Steve Bannon.
A federal court filing in Los Angeles claims that agents of the nation of Qatar gave a payoff to convicted former Trump NSA, Gen. Michael Flynn, and also that he had accepted those payments. (see below) A Qatari spy ring with at least two individuals operating in America as unregistered foreign agents of their highly controversial government stands accused of defamation in the federal lawsuit seeking $1.2 billion in damages.
A former Qatari General Consul let potentially serious information about Flynn slip while forcefully soliciting an American businessman’s help in obtaining contact with his former business colleague Steve Bannon, after the book Fire and Fury came out and the Mercer family fired him from Breitbart, cutting ties. Qatar Investments Director Ahmed al Rumaihi offered to bankroll Bannon’s American political websites and influence operations with his funds from, running an internal division of the Qatar Investment Authority.
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Depending on the timing of any payments to Flynn, it could represent something else far more sinister, or even prove to be a link to the Trump Russia dossier, which outlined a giant Russian oil privatization scheme in which the QIA division purchased nearly 20% of the state-run oil company Rosneft.
Al-Hamadi says that he traveled to America on a B-1 business tourist visa representing the QIA division without diplomatic credentials. He should probably have registered under the Foreign Agents Registration Act for engaging in political action in America.
So the plan here was to bribe Flynn using funds from the QIA, who also happen to have bought 19.5% of the Russian state oil company Rosneft after the election in order to facilitate an offer to bankroll Steve Bannon and get him back up and running on the web after his being ousted by the Mercers at Breitbart and particularly to counter attack Kushner, who was his nemesis in the White House.
This was clearly intended to give them a platform to push back against the Crown Princes and their blockade of Qatar. Just like AT&T who wanted to keep their merger going, and Novartis who wanted to keep the drug profits flowing. When you make it obvious that you’re for sale, tons of people show up with the black cards ready.
All of this begs the question who was Ahmed al-Rumaihi meeting in Trump Tower on December 2016 during the transition as he was escorted by Michael Cohen, what was he offering them and just what was he asking in return?
Despite all this effort trying to work around or against the Kushner's it seem that Qatar eventually caved and through Canadian firm Brookfield Properties — which is 7% owned by Qatar — has brokered a deal to buy all or most of 666 5th Ave from the Kushner companies. Entirely coincidentally this deal has occurred just after the Trump Administration has reversed course on the Qatar blockade and now says that they support a summit to have it ended.
Hmm…. what luck.
While all this has been going on Trump has violated the Iran Nuclear Deal and also transferred the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jeruselem. The response to the former has Russia happy because as European contracts with Iran dry up with the threat of sanctions Russia - who is already sanctioned by the U.S., so they really don't give a frack -- can come swooping in to snap up those contracts and make some quick cool cash.
While Russia has condemned Washington for its withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal, Moscow remains less exposed to the economic consequences of US sanctions than Europe and its companies could even benefit from the move.
“The deal and the lifting of sanctions in 2015 marked the return of European business to Iran. But it’s unlikely they can keep doing business today, giving room to Russia,” said independent political scientist Vladimir Sotnikov.
“Russia can now go ahead at full speed,” he added.
And that means that Trump’s attempt to force a "better deal" with Iran just might face plant while they do deals with Russia instead and our actual allies in Europe just get more and more PO’d with us, particularly as reinstalling the sanctions on Iran — which were originally crafted by Hillary Clinton — causes gas prices to spike.
Unless of course Trump decides as he has with Chinese firm ZTE to completely wave those sanctions just because he doesn’t want to hurt jobs in China.
U.S. President Donald Trump pledged on Sunday to help ZTE Corp “get back into business, fast” after a U.S. ban crippled the Chinese technology company, offering a job-saving concession to Beijing ahead of high-stakes trade talks this week.
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“Too many jobs in China lost. Commerce Department has been instructed to get it done!” Trump wrote on Twitter, saying he and Chinese President Xi Jinping were working together on a solution for ZTE.
The U.S. Commerce Department last month banned American companies from selling to the firm for seven years as punishment for ZTE breaking a 2017 agreement after it was caught illegally shipping U.S. goods to Iran and North Korea, an investigation dating to the Obama administration.
During trade talks in Beijing earlier this month, Chinese Vice Premier Liu He told U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin that China would not continue talks on broader bilateral trade disputes unless Washington agreed to ease the crushing sanctions on ZTE, two people briefed on those meetings said.
“The message was, ‘we have to deal with ZTE before we continue talks’,” one of the people said.
So Trump’s first big move in his trade battle with China is to cave into their demands, because of course he does. This certainly bodes well for his upcoming negotiations with Kim Jong-Un over their Nuclear Arsenal.
Cross your fingers, then kiss your ass good bye.
On the latter issue involving moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem so far Israeli soldiers have killed as many as 50 protestors and demonstrators in Gaza while Kushner — yeah, him again— continues to claim that this is but the “first step towards peace”. Although if this is their first step the next step will probably be to trip on their own shoe laces because they’ve completely destroyed any trust they might have with the Palestinians that they are “neutral brokers” in any potential deal.
Meanwhile House GOPers are sill trying to derail the Mueller investigation this time using an audit as they continue their snipe hunt for confidential DOJ documents they think will prove once and for all that the entire probe is unnecessary, even though it's already produced 5 guilty pleas so far.
Also White tHouse Chief of Staff John Kelly stepped on his own dick again while claiming that illegal immigrants are dumb, uneducated, unskilled, don’t speak English and don’t assimilate while it turns out that his own great grandfather from Italy was undocumented in the U.S. for 18 years and didn’t read, speak or write English.
Daily details for Weekly Update #49 in the Trump Russian Corruption Series are as follows.
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May 8th —
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Politico reports that Trump complains about Giuliani’s TV appearances in private. AP says that he even snapped at his “shadow Chief of Staff” Sean Hannity for saying that money was “funneled through a law firm” because that sounded somewhat illegal [Because it is].
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Giuliani tells CBS news that Mueller had refused to accept written answers from Trump to their 49 questions.
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Political Reports that besides Devin Nunes Trump has “Four Horsemen” in Congress battling against Mueller by trying to smear his investigation and threaten Sessions and Rosenstein with contempt and Impeachment including Reps. Jim Jordan of Ohio, Mark Meadows of North Carolina, Matt Gaetz of Florida and Ron DeSantis, also of Florida
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Friends of Michael Cohen tell Vanity Fair that that he says the FBI investigation of him is a “Nightmare” that is “ruining the lives” of his family.
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Ronan Farrow tell CNN that the women who had come forward about Schneiderman’s abuse were reluctant because they supported him politically and personally. Meanwhile Governor Cuomo asks the Manhattan DA to investigate his case, and they say they have “no current reports” of abuse by him which is ironic since just weeks ago Cuomo had asked Schneiderman to investigate former DA Cyrus Vance Jr. for not looking into abuse by Harvey Weinstein.
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WSJ reports that during a four hour mock interview Trump’s lawyers were only able to get him through the first two questions due to his long answers and frequent National Security interruptions.
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NYTimes reports that Trump told President Macron that he was going to pull out of the Iran Nuclear deal, while Macron tried to talk him out of it.
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Trump announces that America will Violate the Iran Deal (JCPoA and attendant UN Resolutions) to re-instate US Sanctions on Iran and international companies that do business with Iran. This is cheered by Israel, but condemned by Britain, France & Germany and even President Obama.
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Trump’s State Dept can’t answer any questions coherently about why the deal was violated when the IAEA certified Iran’s compliance 11 times, or what happens next, or what sanctions will look like, or whether they have a “Plan B” or a timeline on what happens now.
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CNN reports that Mueller’s airport questioning of sanctioned Russian Oligarch Viktor Vekselberg included inquires about why Columbus Nova a US affiliate of his own company Renova Group which is run by his cousin Andrew Intratar had paid Michael Cohen over $500,000 during 2017 after Trump’s inauguration, which Vekselberg attended. These payments were made to the same LLC shell company Essential Consulting that Cohen had used to pay Stormy Daniels.
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WSJ reports Cohen had arranged $1.6 Million to be paid for the pregnancy and abortion had be former Playboy Playmate Shera Bechard, however Colorado Law professor Paul Campos argues in the New Yorker that this payment was probably made to protect Trump and not former RNC fundraiser Elliot Broidy. “Bechard was actually at one time Hefner’s girlfriend, while Trump and Hefner’s friendship mysteriously came to an end in 2016,” writes Campos. Broidy has a history of bribery and was likely to make tens of $Millions if the DOJ dropped a bribery inquiry involving him and a Malaysia based investment firm 1MDB.
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Senate Intel Chairman Richard Burr burns the House GOP Intel report on the Mueller probe. They didn’t ‘substantiate every conclusion with facts’ [Nope, they didn’t.]
Michael Avenatti releases a document that states that multiple corporations including Columbus Nova, Novartis, Korea Aerospace Industries (KAI) and also AT&T — who are in a lawsuit with Trump over their attempted merger with Time Warner — paid Michael Cohen’s Essential Consulting apparently for “insight” and possibly access to Trump. AT&T confirms they paid Cohen $600,000, which brings the grand total to over $4 Million that Cohen was paid simply for being close to Trump.
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Roger Stone falls to pieces under tough questioning by Andrea Mitchell. Stone then blamed a faulty earpiece for his brief delay before denying that he had met with Mueller and his investigators, and he cast doubt on the U.S. intelligence consensus about Russian hacking of Democratic targets during the 2016 election. “I don’t buy into the premise that Guccifer is indeed a Russian asset,” he said. “I think that is unproved.” [They have his IP address — which was from inside the GRU headquarters — you doof!]
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MSNBC viewers threatened to boycott MSNBC if the network does not fire conservative commentator Hugh Hewitt after a Politico report revealed that he had received special favors from embattled EPA chief Scott Pruitt.
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Coal production is projected to collapse at twice the rate that it had been prior to the Trump era.
- Under cover of night the WH changes the wording on Melania’s “Be Best” pamphlet to give proper credit for it’s creation to the FTC. Then the Office of First Lady blast the “opposition media” for reporting that facts about her pamphlet. “After giving a strong speech that was met with a standing ovation and positive feedback, the focus from opposition media has been on an eduction booklet, ‘Talking with Kids About Being Online’ produced by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) in 2009,” Grisham said. “Despite providing countless outlets with ample background, and on-the-record comments from the FTC, some media have chosen to take a day meant to promote kindness and positive efforts on behalf of children, to instead lob baseless accusations towards the First Lady and her new initiatives.” [Yeah, wow.]
- Don Jr. — the guy whose being divorced because of cheating on his wife and five kids with an Apprentice guest star — tries to throw shade on Eric Schneiderman’s resignation and only sounds like the fucking douche’ nozzle that he is.
- Europe and Iran vow to keep the Nuclear Deal going without the U.S. while Shep Smith scolds a Fox Guest saying we “violated the deal, we didn’t pull out.’
- WaPO reports that Trump is sending a bill to congress with $15 Billion in cuts to previously approved spending, $7 Billion of which comes from the Children's Health Care Fund while the deficit climbs back up to $804 billion.
- Axios reports that WH officials have said that “(Trump) likes it when ‘experts’ are on CNN freaking out,” because he ran his campaign against the “egg-heads” who negotiated the deal [which he doesn’t fully understand.]
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May 9th —
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WaPo reports that the senior DOJ officials the WH and Trump sided against releasing information to Devin Nunes about the start of the Mueller investigation because it involved a U.S. citizen who is a classified confidential source and could expose their identity.
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Fox News reports that 91% of the primetime network news about Trump is negative, so of course he tweets suggesting that he should “take away credentials” from reporters who tell negative stories (which he calls “fake”) about him, just like the tin-pot dictators he admires. He’s previously blocked the Washington Post, and is considering blocking the NYTimes. [The fact that 91% of the reality of Trump’s administration being horrible — doesn’t get mentioned]
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Alex Van der Zwaan the london based lawyer whose father in law is Russian Oligarch German Khan who happens to be business parters with Viktor Vekselberg, who also in turn is in business with Oleg Deripaska begins his 30 day prison sentence in Federal Prison for lying to Federal investigators in the Mueller probe about Rick Gates communicating with former GRU member Konstantin Kilimnick about guess who — Oleg Deripaska.
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Rachel Cook who accused Trump of kissing her without permission in Trump Tower in 2006 wins the Democratic Nomination for seat in the Ohio legislature. Also Don Blankenship loses his bid WV Senate GOP nomination and former CFPB head Richard Cordray wins the Dem nomination of Ohio Senator over Dennis Kucinich.
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WaPo reports that as a gesture of good will from Kim Jong-Un SecState Mike Pompeo will be returning from North Korea with the 3 detainees on his plane.
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Drug company Novartis in 2017 also paid Michael Cohen $1.2 Million through his Essential Consulting LLC apparently for work he didn’t actually do for them. Stat news reports that Cohen had offered to allow them to “gain access to Donald Trump” They had paid him 4 times what they’d paid any other lobbyist and about 10% of their entire lobbying budget for the year.
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RT’s former WH correspondent asks Huckabee-Sanders if Trump is aware that hiring in the government based on political affiliation — since he keeps complaining about 13 Democrats on Mueller’s team — is illegal? And she basically blows off the question.
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Reuters reports that German Foreign minister Heiko Maas says “The [Iran] deal is working. We want to keep in place the controls and transparency rules,” during a conference.
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Jonathan Chait points out that the money paid Cohen by various corporations thru his secret hush-money LLC could have been even more Kompromat for Russia.“For all the speculation about the existence of the pee tape, the latest revelations prove what is tantamount to the same thing,” he writes. “Russia could leverage the president and his fixer… by threatening to expose secrets they were desperate to keep hidden.”
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Chauncey DelaVega writes at Salon that Trump’s attack on America is an implementation of “Sadopopulism” He says “This existential confusion is by design: It is one of the primary weapons of the authoritarian. One of the ways to ground oneself, to create a defense shield against this malignant reality is to document how political, social and cultural norms are being continually broken.”
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Marland Deplorables warn of “Armed Conflict” if Trump is Impeached.
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Fox News says Democrats who opposed Gina Haspel for CIA Director are essentially in league with Khallid Sheik Mohammad. Meanwhile KSM himself makes an emergency request to have his six page statement read into the congressional record during Haspel’s confirmation hearings. During which Haspel refuses to say that torture is immoral under questioning from Sen. Kamala Harris.
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Novartis says that paid Michael Cohen $1,2 Million for one meeting, then determined he was useless but kept paying which shows they have more integrity than Trump when it comes to honoring deals and contracts. During the time that Trump has said he intends to bring down drug prices he supposedly promised them “direct access to Trump” but didn’t deliver it.
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Fox’s Napolitano warns of “imminent” Michael Cohen indictment.
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Trump says everybody wants him to have Nobel prize — even when he’s so far only done the same thing with bringing back NK detainees that Obama did in 2009, has tried to blow up the Paris Accords and the Iran Nuclear Deal — ‘Everyone thinks so but I would never say it’. [Right of course, because he’s obviously much too modest to say it.] Then Mr. Magic Peace Prize says “Iran will negotiate or something will happen.” [If we attack them without provocation or justification who exactly do you think is going to be on the other side? Other than Israel, everyone — even Russia.]
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Phil Mudd calls BS for “collective amnesia” of U.S. Senators who didn’t openly oppose torture who are now coming after Haspel, although the one coming after her is Kamala Harris who wasn’t there 15 years ago and also clearly ignoring the fact that John McCain opposed it openly and loudly.
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Huckabee-Sanders angrily argues that Cohen’s pay-for-play schemes have “nothing to do with the White House” — even though Novartis and AT&T thought that it did.
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20 Years ago Trump new video consigliere Rudy Giuliani argued to Charlie Rose that the President had to testify before the Grand Jury — when that President was Bill Clinton. “You’ve got to do it,” he said. “I mean, you don’t have a choice.”
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Trump Scottish golf course at Turnberry has banned the “second” national drink of Scotland, Irn-Bru, from being sold at it’s course because of potentially damage to it’s carpets -— and Scotland wants to declare war. “The piecemeal ban on Scotland’s other national drink, long avowed as the ultimate hangover cure, has caused inevitable outrage on social media, and will likely swell the protests already planned should Trump visit Scotland as part of his trip to the UK in July,” The Guardian explained.
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Fordham Professor Jed Schugerman writes for Slate that Michael Cohen’s “pay to play” scandal involving Vekselberg may be prove the “collusion case” if it’s linked directly to the Trump admins multiple attempts have Russian Sanctions scuttled — happening at the same time as Kushner and Flynn’s efforts to contact the Kremlin while Cohen own attempted with Felix Sater to implement a Ukraine “peace plan” — until Congress overdid them, since Vekselberg owns 26.5% of Deripaska’s aluminum firm Rural and they were subsequently both sanctioned. Even if Trump didn’t initial know about the payments to Cohen if he found about it later and attempted to cover it up we’re back to obstruction of justice and misprision of felony. Cohen may have also violated FARA by lobbying for Russia and also Korea without being registered just like Flynn and Manafort.
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The Daily Beast reports that Erik Prince has spoken to Mueller’s investigators.
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John Kelly and Rosenstein schedule a meeting with Nunes and others for tomorrow to argue about providing House GOP intel members with information about a confidential source in the Mueller investigation.
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Sanctioned Russia oligarch Viktor Vekselberg was also represented by former Trump lawyer Mark Kasowitz.
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Under Mulvaney the CFPB will but shutting down it’s Student Loan office which had recovered over $750 Million in relief for students in debt.
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Lawyers representing Concord Management and Consulting LLC who were named along with other companies and 13 Russians involved in attempting to influence the 2016 election illegally plead “Not Guilty.” They also made an extensive discovery request of the U.S. Government asking for every document related to “U.S. election meddling” starting back in 1945 to the present in an attempt to try and minimize what their being accused of by saying that the U.S. “does it too.”
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Israeli accuses Iran of rocket attack in Golan.
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Columbus Nova scrubs their website of links to Renova and Vekselberg.
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Fox totally blacks out the latest revelations of corporate influence payments going to Michael Cohen for hours.
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Analysts state that 2019 Obamacare premiums will see double-digit increases mostly due to sabotage of the program by Trump and Republicans, including repealing the individual mandate and undermining the Exchanges.
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Cohen’s attorney files a motion contending the $20,500 worth of payments documented by Avenatti were really to a different “Michael Cohen” who is from Canada. Avenatti says that makes them only 99.35% accurate and tells Rachel Maddow that Novartis actually received a personal lunch meeting with Trump after paying Michael Cohen, and that it wasn’t just 1 Suspicious Activity Report that was sent to Treasury after the payment to Daniels, there were 3 SAR reports.
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May 10th —
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The 3 former North Korean Detainees are greeted by Trump, Pence and their wives at Joint Base Andrews at 3am along with 15 photographers to a pomp and circumstance ceremony that Trump brags has to have the “best ratings of any 3am show in DC ever” [Which tell us exactly what he really cares about. TV Ratings.]
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Scott Dworkin says that he was informed by a Hill Staffer to keep his distance from Devin Nunes and his staff on House Intel because they are under multiple investigations by Special Counsel Mueller.
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McCain defends his decision to give copies of the Steele dossier to James Comey [who already had it actually about a month or so previously.] “It had to be investigated.” He also says that he’s opposes Haspel for CIA Director “it’s disqualifying not to denoucne torture.” A WH staffer responds to McCain by saying “He’ll be dead soon.”
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Dallas Morning News reports that AT&T gave information about Cohen’s payments to Mueller back in November or 2017, which is about the time the also interviewed Vekselberg at an airport.
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Trump said to Giuliani that he knows nothing about the Columbus Nova or other payments to Cohen.
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Pence tells Andrea Mitchell that it’s time for Mueller to “wrap it up” ignoring the fact that congress spent two and a half years investigating Benghazi and ultimately found no wrongdoing or negligence by Hillary Clinton. No one told them to “wrap it up” after just one year.
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WH Chief of Staff John Kelly intervenes in the growing brush fire between Rosenstein and DOJ and Nunes Posse at House Intel over even more document releases beyond the initial memo that launched Mueller investigation, which DOJ has provided already with minimal redactions. They schedule a meeting, but no promises are made.
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Wapo reports that AT&T wanted Cohen advice on their merger with Time Warner which is being blocked by a DOJ lawsuit, as well as other regulatory matters. Their CEO states that the payment was a “big mistake.” WaPo also report that during the 9 years before the election Trump properties received over $400 Million in cash sales.
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NASA program to track greenhouse gases is cancelled, meaning that such data will have to be provided by other nations.
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New NRA President Oliver North says that the organization is “under seige” from civil terrorists in a cyber war from gun control advocates. [It’s also a social and mainstream media blitz.]
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NYTimes reports that Trump ranted at his cabinet for 30 minutes straight, prompting DHS Sec Kirstjen Neilsen to draft a resignation letter in frustration, but she hasn't submitted it yet.
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Dem on the House Intel committee releases 3,400 ads placed on Facebook by the Russia Internet Research Agency for $100,000 which managed to reach 150 Million Americans which shows that they deliberately posted to inflame both the left and the right at the same time driving a wedges between them. The especially focused on Black Lives Matter issues and police violence as well as pro-police and anti-immigration ads.
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May 11th —
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Conservative Naval war college professor Tim Nichols wrote in a twitter thread how Fox News serves as an addictive drug for elderly Americans who are frightened about the pace of change in the United States.
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NPR reports on unearthed documents that show that Alexander Torshin had begun making regular trips to the U.S. to reach out to conservatives including Sarah Palin beginning in 2009,.
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Several cities including Las Vegas, San Antonio, Cleveland, Nashville, and Philadelphia have said they don’t want to host the 2020 Republican National Convention where Trump is likely to be re-nominated. Only Charlotte NC seems actively interested in being a host.
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Details revaeal that it was WH Congressional Communications aide Kelly Sadler who joked that they don’t need to worry about McCain voting against Haspel because “he’ll be dead soon anyway." She does later call Meghan McCain and the family to apologize, but Cindy McCain says it’s not just an attack on John, but his entire family including 7 children and 5 grand-children.
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WH Chief of Staff John Kelly says to NPR that immigrants come to America with too few skills, not knowing the language and not assimilating enough. Naval Officer and NSA analyst Malcolm Nance says his comments are “disgraceful” and that the chief of staff “embraces openly racist & bigoted ideals.” “He would have been kicked out of [the U.S. Marine Corps] for comments fractionally close to this,”
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Next week the Russian Duma will begin voting on measures to make it illegal to comply with U.S. and foreign sanctions punishable with 4 years in prison.
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ABC news reports that witnesses interviewed by Mueller say that he is investigating $Millions from Russia, Saudia Arabia, UEA and Qatar to Trump’s Inauguration, which was overseen by his friend and business partner Tom Barrack. Mueller is also reportedly investigating Cohen's failed attempt to solicit Ford Motor company.
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Dr. Bernice King daughter of MLK calls for a boycott of Waffle House after multiple racial incidents including a recent mass shooting.
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Trump blasts drugmakers, health insurers and pharmacy benefits managers for making prescription drugs unaffordable for Americans, arguing there should be fewer middlemen and more competition. “This is a total ripoff, and we're ending it.” [Yes, it is, but no you’re not. Have you said “Hi” to Novartis yet?] Then he fires his fatuous lips at NAFTA, again.
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Huckabee-Sanders refuse to comment or offer any apology for Kelly Sadler's tasteless joke about McCain saying it’s a “leak about an internal meeting” even though it was a meeting with staffers from congress, who aren’t internal, she ducks and dodges so much it shocks Shep Smith. She also ducks questions about whether Trump’s own tendency to insult people had any impact on Sadler’s comments claiming “We respect all Americans.” [No, you very seriously don’t.]
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Trump says he still has confidence in Scott Pruitt.
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CNN panel slams Huckabee-Sanders for “Willful Ignorance" whlie not even admitting that Sadler made her statements about McCain even after Sadler apologized to Meghan McCain. Except for CNN commentator Rick Santorum who like Huckabee-Sanders is more upset with the leaking of what Sadler said than what she actually said.
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Giuliani says he wouldn't debate Avenatti for $10 Million dollars. [Which is a nice round number for them to request in a defamation judgement. ] He also accelerates in his cheap shots from calling Avenatti an “ambulance chaser” to saying he's a “pimp.” He also says that “Trump blocked the AT&T deal” so that means the money paid to Cohen had no influence, [and/or Cohen committed fraud with his claims he could impact Trump’s decisions] but this also contradicts the DOJ who has claimed their suit wasn't motivated by his political fued with CNN, who are owned by Time Warner.
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WSJ reports that Mueller is seeking documents from Ford about the pitch made to them by Michael Cohen for consulting work which they had turned down.
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Geneologist Jennifer Mendelsohn looks up John Kelly’s ancestors and found out through a 1900 census bureau that Kelly’s great grandfather lived in America undotcumented for 18 years and could not “read, write, or speak English.”
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Right Wing writers like Ben Shapiro again whine that they aren’t taken seriously be legacy media simply because of “political correctness” and not the fact their ideas are obviously bigoted and dumb.
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Bill Maher hilariously points out how Trump’s WH is run exactly like Maria Puzo’s mob bosses.
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Thinkprogress reports that Mueller is investigating the $48 Million in corporate money that was taken in by Trump inaugural committee which included $250,000 from Columbus Nova, $1 Million from Access Industries which is run by Leonard Blavatnick who has extensive ties to Russia, AT&T which gave over $2 Milllion, Sheldon Adelson who gave $5 Million, as well as Pfizer, Lockheed Martin, Dow, Bank of America, Qualcomm, and Boeing who each contributed $1 million to the fund. Most of the record total $107 Million raised wasn’t spent and exactly where that money is now is an open question.
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Thinkprogress also reports that court filings have revealed that Trump was made aware of the sexual allegations against Eric Schneiderman in 2013 while he was perusing the Trump University case after two women came forward and shared allegations with NY lawyer Peter Gleason, who took the information to retired publicist Stephen Dunleavy who in turn told Michael Cohen. Not long afterward Trump tweeted about it painting Schneideman in the same light as former NY Rep. Anthony Weiner and former NY Gov Spitzer.
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Sarah Braasch who had called the police on a black Yale graduate student who was taking a nap in the common room had previously called the police on another black Yale student Jean-Louis Reneson who was simply present in the dorm’s stairwell, and was a friend of Lolade Siyonbola the student who took a nap. Braasch’s Yale biography touts that she had won a Pro/Con debate on slavery claiming “The pro-slavery contingent defeated the abolitionists because, in a democracy, in the land of the free, who are we to tell people that they can’t be slaves if they want to be?” [Yeah, thanks Kanye.] She apparently vehemently opposes hate crimes legislation and Yale’s Humanist blog had removed some of her writings as being “racially insensitive.”
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Wapo reports that Rep Mark Meadows has threatened to request the GAO audit the Mueller probe, even though they already provide detailed reports on their expenses every few weeks.
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May 12th —
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May 13th —
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May 14th —
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WSJ reports that Cohen had attempted to setup a contracting deal with Uber only to be turned down as they mentioned the conflict of interest since he owned so many taxi medallions.
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Trump exempts Chinese tech company ZTE from his Iran sanctions in order to save their jobs, even though there have been warnings since 2012 that ZTE phones have securit concerns and can carry malware that could expose the users personal data to hackers.
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Lucern Intenational CEO Mary Buchzeiger writes in Craine’s Detroit that Trump's proposed tariff’s could ruin her business by disrupting her supply chain. “I am… angry, frustrated and a little scared, because the unintended consequences of the president’s $50 billion tariffs on China would cripple my business in Auburn Hills and strip my 50 employees of their good-paying jobs,” she writes. “This is crazy.”
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The Gaza protest death toll rises to 41 people.
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HHS prepares to create a carve out for rural whites inside their proposed new Medicaid work requirement rules.
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WH aides provide leaks as a way to “fight back” when the lose a policy argument, they also impersonate each other in thier off the record quotes to throw off the sent of leak hunters.
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New York Magazine reports that Shadow Chief of Staff Sean Hannity calls up Trump most weeknights after his show goes off the air around 10pm. Trump is usually alone on the 3rd floor when he calls, and will discuss what Hannity tells him during the day and even call him back while his official aides are there.
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Fox viewers fume at Judge Napolitano “Did they get to Judge Nap too?” because he states that Mueller has a right to finish his investigation.
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Kushner gives a speech in Jeruselum on Israel and calls the 40 embassy protestors killed in Gaza "part of the problem.” [Uh, but the Israeli soldiers who killed them are what — a solution?]
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Reuters reports that EPA Chief Scott Pruitt demandsd his 24/7 protection detail on his first day on the job, which would be before any possible “threats” against him occurred.
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Law and Crime reports that Concord Management who had been charged by Mueller with conspiracy to defraud the US for their connections to the Troll Farm have filed a motion claiming that the indictment against them is too vague that they are being charged for merely “funding free speech” saying that isn’t a crime under the US codes.
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Paul Begala calls BS on Steve Cortes attempts to justify Sadler’s attacks on McCain while being a so-called “pro lifer.” “As a pro-life person, you must be really astoundingly offended that they are mocking a man who is fighting for his life. Right?” Begala said.
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Trumpster Jason Miller tries to claim that the leak is worst than what Sadler said about McCain dying soon, while John Walsh says his statements are “traitorous.”
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Melania is treated in the hospital for a kidney condition.
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Salon reports the Giuliani and Trump’s defense team now plan to “go on offense” against the Mueller probe.
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May 15th
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May 16th —
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Rep. Mike Quigley (D-IL) tell Chris Cuomo that the House GOP has been covering up the Russia scandal by cancelling the House probe before the revelations about Qatar’s attempt to bribe Trump officials were brought to light which means they have more questions for Michael Cohen, Erik Prince and Alexander Nix who may have perjured themselves.
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Huckabee-Sanders rages that the person who leaked Sadler’s slur against John McCain is : ‘A total and complete coward and they should be fired’. But Sadler still works in the WH.
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Democrats on Senate Intelligence releases a preliminary report on the Russian attacks on our elections and concludes:
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Putin interfered because he wanted Trump to win over Hillary.
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Rob Goldstone had attempt to setup a meeting directly between Trump and Putin in an email to Trump assistant Rhona Ghraff saying that “Emin [Agalarov] could set it up.”.
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During the June 8th meeting with Veselnitskaya Manafort cribed notes about “Offshore — Cyprus — 135 Million shares” of an undisclosed company. [Could this be reference to the Qatari QIA purchasing 19% of Rosneft?]
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Manafort also wrote : “Value in Cypress as inter,” followed by the word “illici,” followed by the phrase “Active sponsors of RNC.”
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Rinat Akhmetshin testified that Don Jr. opened the meeting directly asking for dirt on Hillary and he responded that they should “do their own research on her” then continued talking about the Magnitsky Act. [FEC violation & Misprision of Felony]
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Ike Kaveledze testified that Don Jr. had said after they won the election they might take look at the Magnitsky Act issue which confirms what Veselnitskay has said about it. [Corruption, Theft of Honest Services, Logan Act.]
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Russia may have attempted to fund Trump’s campaign via the NRA.
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Trump files his latest financial disclosure forms which now includes payments to Michael Cohen of nearly $200,000, not just the $130,000 reimbursement for the Stormy Daniels payoff. None of these payments were included on his forms last year which has prompted the Ethics Office to make a criminal referral to the DOJ for “false statements” under 18 USC 1001, the same law that Flynn, Papadopoulos and Van Der Zwaan have all pleaded guilty to.
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Fox host Katie Pavlich claims on Outnumbered that the Hillary campaign were the ones really behind the Don Jr/Veselnitskaya meeting because someone from Fusion GPS once talked to Veselnitskaya. [Yeah, Right….]
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Politico reports that EPA’s Inspector General is investigating the use of non-government emails accounts by Scott Pruitt in potential violation of records acts and FOIA.
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DHS Sec. Kistjen Neilsen denies she threatened to resign after being scolded by Trump over the border, however she doesn't deny that she wrote a resignation letter.