For anyone interested, here’s a link to my recent interview on a wide range of topics, including law firms, Trump-Russia, and life. The transcript sub-headings allow readers to skip to specific sections as desired.
Papadopoulos-Page-Flynn…More puzzle pieces come together in this week’s updates to the Trump-Russia Timeline:
Here’s a list of what we added with our Nov. 6 update:
Let’s just say it’s been a busy week for the Timeline.
Here’s a list of what we added with our Nov. 2 update:
With last week’s update, I said you’d learn more about Papadopoulos. I didn’t expect it so soon. Manafort and Gates are big news. Papadopoulos is far bigger.
Here’s a list of what we added to the Trump-Russia Timeline with our Oct. 30 update:
Pence and Papadopoulos pervade this week’s updates to the Trump-Russia Timeline at BillMoyers.com. Never heard of Papadopoulos? You will.
Who’s next?
And check out the new stand-alone Timeline for Paul Manafort.
Here’s a list of what we added with our Oct. 24 update:
Additions to our main Trump-Russia Timeline:
Additions to our timeline of the Comey firing:
Additions to our Kushner Timeline:
Additions to our Pence Timeline:
[This post first appeared on BillMoyers.com on Oct. 23, 2017]
On Oct. 4, 2017, Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Richard Burr (R-NC) said that all issues relating to the investigation into Russian interference with the election remain open. But with respect to the firing of FBI Director James Comey, the committee had gone as far as it could and was passing the baton: “Future questions surrounding Comey’s firing are better answered by the [special] counsel or by the Justice Department,” Burr said.
Special counsel Robert Mueller is reportedly investigating whether Trump’s interactions with Comey amount to obstruction of justice. The charge can be leveled at anyone, including the president, who attempts to influence, obstruct or impede a federal investigation or a judicial process.
Most people assume that Comey’s firing is the linchpin of any obstruction of justice case against Donald Trump. And while it’s certainly important, it’s just one brick in a longer road. The BillMoyers.com Trump-Russia Timeline reveals that Trump’s Comey predicament is far worse than wherever the act of firing him takes Mueller. Long before he dismissed the FBI director — and for months thereafter — Trump took numerous actions that could now support an obstruction of justice charge. Consider:
Why has Trump tried to shut down the Russia investigation, lied about Comey’s firing, persisted in efforts to intimidate key witnesses, inserted himself into misleading statements about his campaign advisers’ meetings with Russians offering to help him win the election, and held the sword of Damocles over the special counsel investigating him? Behind any effort to obstruct justice is a fear of the truth.
In a thorough 108-page factual and legal analysis for the Brookings Institution, Barry H. Berke, Noah Bookbinder, and Norman Eisen outline in great detail the case against Trump. People lie for a reason, and Trump is no exception. What he feared—and apparently still fears—continues to seep out.
Trump’s erratic behavior has many questioning his mental fitness to remain in office. But throughout his life, Trump’s actions have always been rational in a key respect: Trump does what is best for Trump. If that means obstructing justice, so be it.
Could there be a correlation between Trump’s intensifying chaos and the unfolding story of the Trump-Russia investigation?
Additions to our main Trump-Russia Timeline:
Additions to our timeline of the Comey firing:
Additions to our Kushner Timeline:
Lost in the controversy over the “Steele dossier” is an important fact: Key aspects of Christopher Steele’s investigation turned out to be true.
Here’s a list of what we added with our Oct. 9 update:
Additions to our main Trump-Russia Timeline:
Additions to our timeline of the Comey firing:
Additions to our Kushner Timeline:
Here’s a list of what we added with our Oct. 7 update:
Additions to our main Trump-Russia Timeline:
Additions to our timeline of the Comey firing:
Additions to our Kushner Timeline:
Here’s a list of what we added with our Oct. 2 update:
Additions to our main Trump-Russia Timeline:
Additions to our timeline of the Comey firing:
Additions to our Kushner Timeline:
Additions to our Pence Timeline:
Excerpts from my Oct. 3, 2017 appearance on “Dan Rather’s America” (on Radio Andy – Sirius XM 102 Radio):
Steven Harper Tells Dan Rather Why the Russia Investigation Is Not Overblown
https://youtu.be/4HVaplkgrG8
Steven Harper on Jared Kushner’s Role in the Evolving Russia Investigation
https://youtu.be/7O1UnJ_dzws
Is “Attack” Too Strong of a Term to Describe Russia’s Actions?
https://youtu.be/u2MN-Gnvqqk
On Tuesday, Oct. 3, 2017, you can:
[This post first appeared at BillMoyers.com on Sept. 28, 2017.]
NOTE: On October 3, 2017 at 10:00 EDT/9:00 CDT, my interview with Dan Rather on the Trump-Russia Timeline will air on “Dan Rather’s America” — Radio Andy, Sirius XM 102
Former White House counsel John Dean counted 21 lawyers involved in Watergate wrongdoing. Among the most prominent were President Richard M. Nixon, White House Domestic Affairs Adviser John Ehrlichman, Attorney General John Mitchell, Nixon’s personal attorney Herbert Kalmbach, White House special counsel Charles Colson, Egil “Bud” Krogh—who headed the “Plumbers” unit involved in the break-in—and Dean himself. History may not repeat itself, but sometimes it rhymes.
Obstructing justice requires more than a president’s single-handed efforts. It’s a team sport. Whether intentional or unwitting, complicit attorneys bring a unique disgrace to their profession and do enormous damage to the country. Upon admission to the bar, all of Trump’s advisers with JDs swore an oath to defend the Constitution and uphold the rule of law. Beginning the week of Oct. 1, many of them could face tough questions about whether they witnessed or participated in criminal wrongdoing at the highest levels of government.
At the moment, special counsel Robert Mueller has Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort (JD, Georgetown, ’74) in the hottest seat. But Mueller has also informed the White House that he wants to interview at least three lawyers who are present or former staffers. Others inside and outside the White House could join that line.
If he is following a typical prosecutorial approach—working from the bottom up in questioning witnesses who may have information pertinent to the investigation—Mueller has already reached rarified air. One of his early picks now sits in the office that John Dean once occupied, White House counsel Don McGahn (JD, Widener, ‘94), who reportedly has “a couple documents” so sensitive that he keeps them locked in a safe and away from Trump’s personal attorney, Ty Cobb (JD, Georgetown, ’78). Thanks to Cobb’s recent public comments over lunch with another Trump attorney, John Dowd (JD, Emory, ’65), Mueller can now be quite specific in seeking that material.
Long before the Cobb-Dowd luncheon that will become a case study in law school courses on professional irresponsibility, Mueller said he wanted to speak with one of McGahn’s deputies, James Burnham, (JD, U of Chicago, ’09). Burnham was reportedly with McGahn on Jan. 26, 2017, when acting Attorney General Sally Yates told them about her concerns with then-national security adviser Michael Flynn. Yet for more than two weeks after that briefing, Flynn remained in the nation’s most sensitive national security post. Reasonable investigators might want to know what McGahn did during to protect the country during that period. After all, the White House counsel is not any president’s personal attorney.
The third lawyer reportedly on Mueller’s current request list is Reince Priebus (JD, Miami, ’98). Other than as an indefatigable Trump defender, Priebus’ role in the Flynn episode is unclear. But Priebus was at the center of another Trump firestorm: the cover-up relating to the firing of FBI Director James Comey.
Apparently, Mueller has not yet questioned other attorneys involved in the Comey cover-up, but everyone knows who they are. Jared Kushner (JD/MBA, NYU, ’07) spent the weekend at Bedminster, NJ urging Trump to fire Comey. Then he reportedly joined Priebus, McGahn, and Vice President Mike Pence (JD-Indiana-Robert W. McKinney, ’86) to draft talking points. Pence saw or heard Trump read aloud his four-page letter outlining the reasons he was firing Comey. Pence also took the cover-up to Capitol Hill.
A president’s outside attorneys are at risk, too. On July 12, 2017, one of Trump’s personal lawyers, Jay Sekulow (JD, Mercer, ’80), told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos that Trump had no role in drafting Don Jr.’s first misleading statement about the June 9, 2016 meeting between top Trump advisers and three Russians. “The president didn’t sign off on anything,” he said. Four days later, he told NBC’s Chuck Todd the same thing: “I do want to be clear – that the president was not involved in the drafting of the statement and did not issue the statement.” Sekulow’s best defense now is that he didn’t know what he was talking about.
Since Nixon’s impeachment, the seminal lesson of political scandals has been: “It’s not the crime; it’s the cover-up.” Eventually, the public will learn whether Trump’s advisers have heeded that lesson. When that day arrives, it could become an especially embarrassing moment for those with legal degrees.
If you think it’s been a quiet week for the Trump-Russia story at BillMoyers.com, think again….
Additions to our main Trump-Russia Timeline:
Additions to our timeline of the Comey firing:
Crossing Hoffa: A Teamster’s Story
My first book — a Chicago Tribune “Best Book of the Year” — is now available in paperback
You can read it on Kindle, too.
Click here to read some of the reviews
Here are the latest updates the Trump-Russia, Kushner, and Comey Firing Timelines to include these entries at BillMoyers.com:
Additions to our main Trump-Russia Timeline:
Additions to our Kushner Timeline:
Additions to our timeline of the Comey firing:
It’s already been a busy week for the Trump-Russia Timeline and a bad week for Paul Manafort. Here are the Updates so far:
Additions to our main Trump-Russia Timeline:
Additions to our timeline of the Comey firing:
The latest developments at the Charlotte School of Law are the culmination of regulatory capture. The last significant ABA task force addressing the crisis in legal education kicked the can down the road, as did all of its predecessors. That came as no surprise because the head of the task force was Dennis W. Archer. He also chaired the national policy board of InfiLaw, a consortium of Charlotte and two other marginal for-profit law schools owned by venture capitalists.
The Persistent Problem
Without the ability to exploit vulnerable prospective law students willing to incur six-figure law school debt in return for limited prospects of meaningful JD-required jobs, the InfiLaw schools—Charlotte, Arizona Summit, and Florida Coastal School of Law—probably would have gone out of business long ago. It’s a safe bet that InfiLaw’s owners would not send their kids to any of them.
Only recently did the ABA take steps to revoke Charlotte’s accreditation. The school lost access to student loan money, and now its doors are closed. In March 2017, the ABA put Arizona Summit on probation for reasons that included a 25 percent bar exam passage rate for its July 2016 graduates taking the test for the first time. Florida Coastal’s 2016 graduates are faring so poorly in the job market that its end may be in sight: only 36 percent of graduates obtained full-time long-term JD-required jobs. Meanwhile, Florida Coastal grads have the distinction of obtaining degrees from a school that is among the leaders in law school debt: almost $160,000. Arizona Summit’s grads are right up there with them.
For years, InfiLaw has been a poster child for a persistent problem, but it’s not the only offender. Ten years after the Great Recession decimated the demand for new law school graduates, the ABA has ignored a perverse incentive system arising from a dysfunctional market. Specifically, marginal law schools lack accountability for their graduates’ poor job prospects. Those schools live on student loans—which is to say that they would die without them. But once students make their tuition payments, their schools have no skin in the game.
Even Archer’s task force report acknowledged that 25 percent of law schools derive at least 88 percent of their revenues from tuition. The overriding goal becomes maximizing revenues by filling classroom seats with tuition-paying bodies. At most marginal schools, that has meant lowering admission standards–an action that later reflects itself in declining bar passage rates for graduates. The result: unemployed law school graduates are burdened with enormous non-dischargeable debt for degrees of dubious value.
What Will It Take?
Perhaps a Charlotte whistleblower will bring change to a profession that has shown a consistent unwillingness to police itself. The allegations from former Charlotte School of Law Professor Barbara Bernier, who filed suit in June 2016 under the False Claims Act, prompted a federal investigation. She alleges that the school defrauded taxpayers of more than $285 million over a five-year period. According to the suit, Charlotte used dubious tactics to shore up the school’s performance numbers, protect its accreditation, and keep federal student loan dollars flowing.
Bernier claims that admissions officers had quotas of students they had to accept to keep their jobs. She alleges that over a six-year period beginning in 2010, 1,355 substandard students were enrolled, resulting in improper government payments to the school totaling $285 million. She asserts that the school discouraged some students from taking the bar exam because it thought they were likely to fail. Even so, the school’s pass rate has dropped steadily and its February 2017 results were the worst in the state: 25 percent. For those repeating the exam, the February 2017 news was worse: 18 percent passed.
How could this happen? A better question is, why wouldn’t it? Bernier’s allegations are consistent with revenue-maximizing behavior that the current law school business model incentivizes without regard to graduates’ outcomes.
“At Charlotte, there was constant talk of investors — referring to the school’s owners,” the Charlotte School of Law whistleblower professor told The New York Times, “and the focus was on the number of students. They were bringing them in and setting them up and then failing them out.”
InfiLaw has until Oct. 20 to file a formal answer to the complaint. Perhaps someday its owners and those who run other marginal law schools across the country will answer to their students who leave such institutions with big debt and limited JD-required job prospects. Every year, the ranks of those alumni grow.
[This article first appeared at Billmoyers.com on Sept. 19, 2017]
Trump dominates the news constantly. But consider the timing of his most stunning words, deeds and tweets in the context of the Trump-Russia Timeline and this question emerges: What happened in the Russia investigation to set him off this time? Sometimes, the public doesn’t learn the answer for months. But eventually, a pattern becomes clear. Some of his worst outbursts are connected to his biggest problem: Russia.
For example, on Jan. 27, Trump issued his first immigration travel ban. Defense Secretary James Mattis saw the executive order only a few hours before Trump arrived at the Pentagon for the signing ceremony. As Trump signed it, Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly was on the phone receiving his first full briefing on the new policy. Because Customs and Border Protection officials had no advance warning that the ban was coming, the result was worldwide chaos. Airports became scenes of mass demonstrations.
Everyone listening to Trump’s campaign rhetoric knew that some kind of immigration ban was coming. But why rush it out only a week after the inauguration? Observers blamed the debacle on incompetence and inexperience. But perhaps other events — unknown to the public at the time — played a part.
A day before Trump issued the ban, Acting Attorney General Sally Yates was telling White House counsel Don McGahn that then-national security adviser Michael Flynn was vulnerable to Russian blackmail. She said that White House statements about Flynn’s contacts with the Russian ambassador in late December 2016 — as President Obama was imposing new sanctions for Putin’s interference with the US election — didn’t line up with what the Justice Department knew to be true. The next day, Trump invited then-FBI Director James Comey to dinner, where he asked for Comey’s personal loyalty and received a cool response.
A single coincidence of three stunning events — Yates’ revelations to McGahn, the Comey loyalty dinner, and the botched rollout of an illegal travel ban — would not alone prove that Trump’s most jaw-dropping comments, accusations and policy pronouncements are reactions to or deflections from bad news about the Russia investigation. But consider the context surrounding some of Trump’s other dramatic presidential moments.
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In context, Trump’s dangerous and often divisive outbursts suggest that the country is at the mercy of a president who uses the power of his office to exploit a manipulable press, vulnerable citizens and tragic events in the service of eclipsing the issue that continues to dog his presidency: the Russia investigation. They’re also what poker players call “tells” — inadvertent revelations. When he acts out in ways that are extreme — even for Trump — he could be revealing that something he doesn’t like is unfolding in the story that he wants everyone to ignore: Russia. At those moments, everyone should pay especially close attention to it.
Here are the latest additions to the Trump-Russia Timeline at Billmoyers.com. I’ve also added new names to the Timeline’s filtering function: Steve Bannon, Robert Mercer, Julian Assange, Rep. Dana Rohrbacher, Rep. Devin Nunes, and Cambridge Analytica.
Additions to our main Trump-Russia Timeline:
Additions to our Kushner Timeline:
The plot thickens: Newest Additions to the Trump-Russia Timeline at Billmoyers.com. Here are the titles of the new or newly revised entries:
Here’s a link to the newest additions to the Trump-Russia Timeline at Billmoyers.com. The summary titles may pique your interest:
All eyes have been on Harvey-DACA-Korea-Irma. But the Trump-Russia TImeline on BillMoyers.com has stunning new entries.
And we now have new Interactive versions of
The Pence Timeline,
The Kushner Timeline, and
Here are the latest additions to the Trump-Russia Timeline at BillMoyers.com. More updates are in process and you can see a summary of the latest entires in a separate post appearing next to the introduction to the Trump-Russia Timeline.
Oct. 28, 2015: Trump Signs Letter of Intent for Trump Tower in Moscow
Trump signs a letter of intent for the use of his name on a planned Trump Tower in Moscow. If completed it would be one of the largest residential projects in real estate history and, according to Felix Sater, the ”the world’s tallest building in Moscow.” A Moscow-based developer, I.C. Expert Investment Co., would have paid Trump a licensing fee. After news of the deal breaks in August 2017, Trump Organization Executive Vice President and attorney Michael Cohen tells The Wall Street Journal that he had discussed the proposal with Trump once before Trump signed it and a second time when he did. [Added Aug. 30, 2017]
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November 2015 – January 2016: Pursuit of Trump Tower in Moscow
A February 2017 article in The New York Times, citing Felix Sater, reports that Trump’s bid for the presidency brings work on a Trump Tower in Moscow to a halt in the Fall of 2015. Emin Agalarov makes a similar statement in a March 2017 interview with Forbes; Agalarov says he and his father had previously signed a letter of intent with their Trump counterparts to build a Trump Tower in Moscow. “He ran for president, so we dropped the idea,” Agalarov says. “But if he hadn’t run we would probably be in the construction phase today.”
Later reporting indicates the story might not be so simple.
In July 2017, Yahoo! News’ Michael Isikoff reports that work with the Agalarovs to build a Trump Tower in Moscow came to a halt because of an economic downturn in Russia that was caused, in part, by sanctions the US and others imposed on Russia in 2014, following its intervention in Ukraine.
In an Aug. 1, 2017 article, Talking Points Memo’s Sam Thielman reports that Sater was still working on a deal for Trump Tower in Moscow in “November-December” 2015. In interviews with Thielman, Sater claims that it didn’t involve the Agalarovs, but he doesn’t elaborate.
On Aug. 27, 2017, The Washington Post reports that, in November 2015, Sater urges Trump to come to Moscow to tout the proposal and suggests that he “could get President Vladimir Putin to say ‘great things’ about Trump.” According to The Post, “Sater also predicted in an email that he and Trump Organization leaders would soon be celebrating — both one of the biggest residential projects in real estate history and Donald Trump’s election as president, according to two of the people with knowledge of the exchange.” The Post also reports that, “Sater wrote to Trump Organization Executive Vice President Michael Cohen ‘something to the effect of, “Can you believe two guys from Brooklyn are going to elect a president?”’”
On Aug. 28, 2017, The New York Times picks up the story, quoting from one of Sater’s Nov. 3, 2015 emails to Cohen: “I will get Putin on this program and we will get Donald elected… Buddy our boy can become president of the USA and we can engineer it. I will get all of Putin’s team to buy in on this, I will manage this process.”
Following Sater’s recommendation, in January 2016, Cohen seeks the help of Dmitry Peskov, Putin’s personal spokesperson and the Kremlin’s top press aide. According to subsequent reporting in The Washington Post, Cohen writes, “Over the past few months I have been working with a company based in Russia regarding the development of a Trump Tower – Moscow project in Moscow City. Without getting into lengthy specifics the communication between our two sides has stalled. As this project is too important, I am hereby requesting your assistance. I respectfully request someone, preferably you, contact me so that I might discuss the specifics as well as arranging meetings with the appropriate individuals. I thank you in advance for your assistance and look forward to hearing from you soon.”
Peskov receives Cohen’s email, and later says, “But as far as we don’t respond to business topics, this is not our job, we did not send a response.”
According to The Post, “Trump never went to Moscow as Sater proposed. And although investors and Trump’s company signed a letter of intent, they lacked the land and permits to proceed and the project was abandoned at the end of January 2016, just before the presidential primaries began, several people familiar with the proposal said.”
On Aug. 28, 2017, the Trump Organization issues a statement saying, “To be clear, the Trump Organization has never had any real estate holdings or interests in Russia.”
Cohen likewise issues a statement, saying, “I did not ask or brief Mr. Trump, or any of his family, before I made the decision to terminate further work on the proposal. The Trump Tower Moscow proposal was not related in any way to Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign.” In an Aug. 28, 2017 interview with The Wall Street Journal, Cohen says he discussed the proposal with Trump only three times: once before Trump signed the Oct. 28, 2015 letter of intent, a second time when Trump signed it, and a third time when work on the deal ended. [Revised Sept. 1, 2017]
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April 3, 2016: Panama Papers Leaked
A massive leak of more than 11 million papers from the world’s fourth largest offshore law firm reveals a money trail allegedly showing a network of secret offshore deals and vast loans worth $2 billion leading to Russia’s president Vladimir Putin and his associates. Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin’s top spokesperson, dismisses the accusations as “another series of fibs.” Beyond Russia, the Panama Papers implicate politicians and public leaders throughout the world and, over the subsequent year, lead to audits, investigations, inquiries, and arrests in at least 79 countries. In February 2017, Panama police arrest the founders of the law firm at the center of the scandal and charge them with money laundering. They deny wrongdoing. [Added Aug. 30, 2017]
April 8, 2016: Putin Convenes Russian Federation Security Council
Since Jan. 15, 2016, Putin has been meeting weekly with the Russian Federation Security Council weekly. As the leak of the Panama Papers approached, the council met more frequently — on March 28, 31 and April 5. The Kremlin’s official summary of the April 8 meeting states, “Participants discussed the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and the efforts Russia is undertaking these days to facilitate it. Current domestic and international issues were also discussed with a special focus on the creation of the National Guard.”
Russian investigative journalists Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan — experts on how the Kremlin operates in the digital sphere — believe there was actually more going on. In August 2017, they told The Washington Post that “the meeting of the Russian Security Council on April 8, when Putin urgently gathered only the most trusted officials — most of them with secret services background — could be the meeting when a very sensitive matter was discussed, such as the need for a retaliatory response to the Panama Papers exposés.”
Soldatov and Borogan wrote in a 2017 book that Russian interference in the US election may have been a response to the Panama Papers. “Putin believed the Panama Papers attack was sponsored by Hillary Clinton’s people — this, in a way, provided him with a ‘justification’ for a retaliatory operation,” they told The Post. [Added Aug. 30, 2017]
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Aug. 7, 2017: Trump Complains About Bill to Limit His Power to Fire Mueller
Four days after Sen. Thom Tillis (R-NC) had co-sponsored legislation that would limit Trump’s ability to fire special counsel Mueller, Trump reportedly calls Tillis to complain about the bill and say that he doesn’t want it to pass. According to Politico, in late July, Trump had also called Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) to complain about the then-pending Russian sanctions bill. Corker reportedly told Trump that the legislation would pass both houses of Congress with bipartisan support. “It seems he is just always focused on Russia,” one senior GOP aide tells Politco. [Added Aug. 28, 2017]
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Aug. 9, 2017: Trump Blasts McConnell Over Russia Investigation
During a phone call that became a profane shouting match, Trump reportedly accuses Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) of bungling the health care issue. But according to subsequent reporting by The New York Times citing Republicans briefed on the conversation, Trump is even more upset that McConnell has, in his view, not protected him from investigations of Russia’s election interference. [Added Aug. 28, 2017]
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Aug. 11, 2017: Russian Lobbyist Testifies Before Mueller’s Grand Jury
Rinat Akhmetshin, a Russian lobbyist who, along with Russians Natalie Veselnitskaya and Ike Kaveladze, attended the June 9, 2016 meeting at Trump Tower with Donald Trump, Jr., Jared Kushner, and Paul Manafort, testifies for several hours before special counsel Mueller’s grand jury. [Added Sept. 1, 2017]
Aug. 11, 2017: House Democrats Renew Request to Subpoena Deutsche Bank Documents Relating to Trump
Democrats on the House Committee on Financial Services ask Chairman Jeb Hensarling (R-TX) to issue a subpoena to Deutsche Bank. They request that the subpoena seek documents relating to Russian money-laundering and to Deutsche Bank accounts involving Trump and his family. The Democratic committee members note that Rep. Hensarling never answered their March 10, 2017 letter seeking a “thorough, objective, and bipartisan investigation…into the Russian money laundering scheme at Deutsche Bank….” [Added Aug. 28, 2017]
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Aug. 22, 2017: Fusion GPS Co-Founder Testifies About “Steele Dossier”
Glenn Simpson, a former reporter for The Wall Street Journal and co-founder of the consulting firm Fusion GPS, testifies to Senate Judiciary Committee investigators for more than 10 hours.
Working for a client that it has not yet named, Fusion GPS had hired former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele to compile what became the infamous “Steele dossier” about Trump’s alleged ties to Russia. Trump has decried the dossier as fake news, and US intelligence officials have testified that it was not the basis for any US intelligence findings of Russian interference with the 2016 election.
It remains unclear which, if any, of the allegations in the dossier US officials have been able to confirm independently. In a statement following Simpson’s session with the committee, Simpson’s lawyer says, “Fusion GPS is proud of the work it has conducted and stands by it.” [Added Aug. 28, 2017]
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Aug. 25, 2017: Mueller Subpoenas Grand Jury Witnesses in Manafort Probe
NBC News reports that special counsel Robert Mueller has subpoenaed public relations executives who worked with Paul Manafort’s international lobbying effort on behalf Ukraine from 2012 to 2014. According to Manafort’s subsequently amended reports, a pro-Russian political party that ran the country had paid Manafort $17 million for his consulting work during that period. [Added Aug. 28, 2017]
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Aug. 25, 2017: Mueller Investigating Possible Flynn Connection to Clinton Email Project
The Wall Street Journal reports that Mueller is examining the role, if any, that Trump’s former national security adviser Mike Flynn may have played in Peter W. Smith’s effort to obtain Hillary Clinton’s emails from Russian hackers during the campaign. Smith was a long-time political operative who had told the Journal in May 2017 that during September 2016 he had tried to assemble a team that would pursue those emails. Smith died ten days after the interview. [Added Aug. 28, 2017]
Aug. 29, 2017: CNN reports that special counsel Robert Mueller has subpoenaed Paul Manafort’s former lawyer and Manafort’s current spokesperson. [Added Aug. 30, 2017]
Aug. 30, 2017: Mueller Consulting with NY Attorney General on Manafort
Politico reports that, in recent weeks, teams working with special counsel Mueller and New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman have been sharing evidence in connection with their investigations of Paul Manafort and his financial transactions. [Added Sept. 1, 2017]
Aug. 30, 2017: More Reports on Manafort Ties to Russian Oligarch
The Wall Street Journal reports on Manafort’s alleged financial dealings with Oleg Derispaka, a Russian oligarch. According to The Journal, the dealings began in 2004 and the two men had a falling out, cutting ties in 2014, but Manafort’s work for Ukraine continued into 2015. According to a court filing on Deripaska’s behalf in May 2017, he “never had any arrangement, whether contractual or otherwise, with Mr. Manafort to advance the interests of the Russian government.” [Added Sept. 1, 2017]
Aug. 30, 2017: Cohen Rebuts “Steele Dossier”
The New York Times reports that Michael Cohen’s lawyer has provided the House Intelligence Committee with an eight-page, point-by-point rebuttal of the allegations in the ‘Steele dossier’ insofar as they pertain to Cohen. “We have not uncovered a single document that would in any way corroborate the dossier’s allegations regarding Mr. Cohen, nor do we believe that any such document exists,” wrote Cohen’s lawyer. “Mr. Cohen vehemently denies the claims made in the dossier about him, which are false and remain wholly unsubstantiated.” [Added Sept. 1, 2017]
I’m grateful that The Last Word With Lawrence O’Donnell keeps focus on Trump/Russia as Trump does everything he can to distract attention away from his biggest problem. Here’s the link to our discussion on August 28.
Tonight (8/28) on The Last Word With Lawrence O’Donnell, (MSNBC, 10:00 EDT), I’ll be connecting the latest Trump-Russia dots in The Washington Post story on Trump’s pursuit of a Moscow real estate deal into 2016 — months after announcing his presidential bid.
[This post first appeared on Bill Moyers & Company on Aug. 22, 2017.]
Another Trump cover-up collapses. Like its predecessors, it involves Russia. Also like it’s predecessors, Trump is at the center. People lie for a reason. What was Trump’s reason this time?
Perhaps Trump had hoped that the public would never learn about the three Russian participants at the infamous June 9, 2016 meeting with his top campaign advisers. Maybe he thought that branding the episode as an innocuous discussion about a moribund Russian adoption program would glide him past another scandalous event in the Trump-Russia saga. What he probably sought most was to deflect attention away from what actually occurred on June 9: Putin’s self-interested desire for relief from US sanctions converged with Trump’s self-interested prior Russian business dealings to solidify Trump’s position as the Kremlin’s candidate for president of the United States.
Russian Adoptions?
In 2012, Putin stopped the Russian adoption program in retaliation for US sanctions under the Magnitsky Act. The law originated with Russian attorney Sergei Magnitsky, who uncovered a $230 million scheme involving Russian officials stealing tax money and plowing some of it into private assets in Western countries. Shortly after Magnitsky testified against those officials in 2008, the Russians arrested him, put him in prison, and abused him until he died a year later at age 37. Magnitsky’s client in the tax investigation, American financier William Browder, sought justice. His efforts culminated in the law that, among other sanctions, freezes and seizes assets belonging to Russian human rights abusers—including those responsible for Magnitsky’s death.
Repealing the Magnitsky Act has become one of Putin’s top foreign policy objectives. Two of the three Russians in the June 9, 2016 meeting with top Trump campaign advisers have been central players in Putin’s efforts: attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya and lobbyist Rinat Akhmetshin.
Veselnitskaya’s clients have included state-owned businesses and the successor to the KGB. She was also helping a defendant in the Prevezon case, which alleged money laundering of some of the $230 million that Sergei Magnitsky had uncovered. According to then-US Attorney Preet Bhahara’s 2013 announcement of that civil forfeiture action, the laundering occurred through “pricey Manhattan real estate.”
Rinat Akhmetshin later confirmed to the Associated Press that he had served in a Soviet military unit that was part of counterintelligence (but said he was never formally trained as a spy). He’s now a lobbyist seeking repeal of the Magnitsky Act.
The third Russian in the meeting provided a link to Trump’s prior Russian business interests. Ike Kaveladze is vice president of Russian oligarch Aras Agalarov’s company, Crocus Group. Agalarov and his son, Emin, were instrumental in bringing the 2013 Miss Universe pageant to Moscow. Trump earned almost $20 million for that event. The Agalarovs had also worked on developing a Trump Tower in Moscow.
Another Botched Cover-Up
On July 7, 2017, The New York Times told Donald Trump Jr. that it was about to run the first story on the June 9 meeting. Weeks earlier, Jared Kushner’s attorneys had discovered Don Jr.’s email chain that set up the session, which included Kushner and campaign chairman Paul Manafort.
The subject line read: “Russia-Clinton-private and confidential.”
The initial message—from the publicist for Emin Agalarov—said that Russia’s top prosecutor was offering “to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia” as “part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr. Trump…”
Seventeen minutes later, Don Jr. responded: “If it’s what you say I love it especially later in the summer.”
Long before the Times called, the Trump and Kushner legal teams had been debating the best way to deal with this ticking bomb. Returning from the G-20 summit aboard Air Force One on July 8, Trump and his team knew that the Times story required a decision: transparency or obfuscation? Trump cast the only vote that counted. Transparency lost.
Drip, Drip, Drip
Trump helped draft Don Jr.’s misleading statement that read, in pertinent part:
“It was a short introductory meeting. I asked Jared and Paul to stop by. We primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children that was active and popular with American families years ago and was since ended by the Russian government, but it was not a campaign issue at the time and there was no follow up….”
After Don Jr. issued a second incomplete statement, he finally released his June 2016 email chain. Immediately, his initial statement came under attack as deceptive at best. But in the ultimate irony, Trump praised his son’s transparency:
On July 25, 2017, things became stickier. William Browder released his prepared remarks for the Senate Judiciary Committee. His statement and subsequent appearance on July 27 didn’t receive much coverage because, at 8 a.m. on July 26, Trump tweeted out a transgender military ban that his senior military officers immediately disavowed. In addition to isolating already vulnerable citizens, those tweets sucked all of the oxygen from the day’s news cycle and suffocated Browder’s testimony, which should have made headlines.
Browder connected dots that put the June 9 meeting in a stunning new light. He explained why Putin was so focused on repealing the Magnitsky Act: “Since 2012 it’s emerged that Vladimir Putin was a beneficiary of the stolen $230 million that Sergei Magnitsky exposed.” Browder testified that this worries Putin because “he keeps his money in the West and all of his money in the West is potentially exposed to asset freezes and confiscation. Therefore, he has a significant and very personal interest in finding a way to get rid of the Magnitsky sanctions.” According to Browder, the sanctions create another problem for Putin because they “destroy the promise of impunity he’s given to all of his corrupt officials.”
Eroding Defenses
Trump’s latest cover-up ended on July 31, 2017, when The Washington Post’s headline proclaimed: “Trump dictated son’s misleading statement on meeting with Russian lawyer.” Even press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders admitted that Trump “weighed in” on Don Jr.’s statement before it went out.
The revelation was just another of the presidential lies permeating the Trump-Russia story. For months, Trump and his minions insisted that there had been no contact with Russians during the campaign. They were lying.
Trump’s second defense admitted to such contacts, but asserted there was no evidence of collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign. A related talking point was that Russia actually wanted Hillary Clinton to win because Putin feared that Trump would be tougher on Russia. Don Jr.’s email chain obliterated those positions.
While trying to explain away Don Jr.’s emails, Trump tried a third defense: anyone would have taken the June 9 meeting. “It’s called opposition research,” Trump said. That defense quickly became counterproductive because accepting help from a foreign adversary is illegal.
Trump and his minions then moved to defenses four and five: The Russians didn’t offer anything helpful, and whatever they did to help Trump hadn’t made a difference. Those “believe me,” “trust me” assertions from a serial liar aren’t working.
We’re now at defense number six: ignore whatever happened. Trump is still a legitimately elected president. But the evaporation of defenses one through five are making that a tough sell.
As the facts seep out, Trump uses every available obstacle—even prevarication from his son’s mouth—to block pathways to the truth. The inference is unavoidable: That truth must be worth hiding.
We’ve added a new feature to accompany the Interactive Trump-Russia Timeline at Billmoyers.com. It identifies by date and title the most recent additions to the Timeline. For this transitional week, I’ve included here the complete text of each new entry in the Trump-Russia Timeline, some of which also apply to the separate Pence Timeline, Kushner Timeline, and Comey Firing Timeline. For future updates, go directly to the “Newest Additions” link at Billmoyers.com
May 14, 1984: Trump Opens His First Atlantic City Casino
The Trump Organization opens Harrah’s at Trump Tower—the first of three Trump casinos in Atlantic City, NJ by 1990. [Added Aug. 21, 2017]
***
NEW: April 3, 1987: Australian Concerns About Alleged “Trump Mafia Connections”
In connection with Trump’s request to build a new casino in Sydney, Australia, the New South Wales Police Board issues its confidential report on whether Trump has the required “sound repute, probity and integrity” for the project. A month later, the May 4, 1987 confidential minutes of the New South Wales Cabinet Casino Subcommittee quote portions of the board’s report, including: “Atlantic City would be a dubious model for Sydney and in our judgement, the Trump Mafia connections should exclude the Kern/Trump consortium.” The minutes also quote this conclusion from the police board: “On tests of sound repute, probity and integrity,” Trump’s consortium “would be dangerous.”
The subcommittee minutes also summarize a conclusion from CIBC Australia Ltd., a subsidiary of the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, which reviewed the financial aspects of Trump’s proposal: “The projected casino revenue estimates are not soundly based and the quantum of the potential overstatement is so material that [the proposal] is not financially viable.” [Added Aug. 21, 2017]
***
2002: Trump’s Russian Real Estate Dealings Expand
Efforts to sell Russians apartments in Trump World Tower, Trump’s West Side condominiums and Trump’s building on Columbus Circle expand with presentations in Moscow involving Sotheby’s International Realty and a Russian realty firm.
In addition to buying units in Trump World Tower, Russians and Russian-Americans flood into another Trump-backed project in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida. According to Reuters’ investigation, in South Florida alone, members of the Russian elite eventually invest more than $98 million in seven Trump-branded luxury towers. Owners of another one-third of the more than 2000 units are limited liability companies that can hide a true owner’s identity. [Revised Aug. 21, 2017]
***
March 21, 2016: Trump Lists Page and Papadopoulos as Foreign Policy Advisers
In a Washington Post interview, Trump identifies Carter Page as one of his foreign policy advisers. Page had helped open the Moscow office of investment banking firm Merrill Lynch and had advised Russian state-owned energy giant Gazprom, in which Page is an investor. He blames 2014 US sanctions relating to Russia’s annexation of Crimea for driving down Gazprom’s stock price. Earlier in March 2016, Iowa tea party activist Sam Clovis had recommended Page to the Trump campaign.
In the same interview, Trump says that George Papadopoulos is also a member of his foreign policy team. “He’s an energy and oil consultant, excellent guy,” Trump says. [Revised Aug. 21, 2017]
***
March 24, 2016: Papadopoulos Suggests Russia Meeting
Three days after Trump identifies George Papadopoulos as a member of his foreign policy team, Papadopoulos sends an email to seven campaign officials with the subject line: “Meeting with Russian Leadership – Including Putin.” According to later reporting from The Washington Post, he offers to set up “a meeting between us and the Russian leadership to discuss US-Russia ties under President Trump,” telling them his Russian contacts welcomed the opportunity. Some Trump advisers express concern about the legality of meeting with Putin or his representatives. But for the next several months, Papadopoulos sends additional emails about Russia’s desire for such a meeting. [Added Aug. 21, 2017]
***
June 7, 2016: Trump Promises to Reveal “Things That Have Taken Place With the Clintons”
After winning the New Jersey primary as the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee for president, Trump includes these lines in his victory speech: “I am going to give a major speech on probably Monday of next week [June 13] and we’re going to be discussing all of the things that have taken place with the Clintons… Hillary Clinton turned the State Department into her private hedge fund – the Russians, the Saudis, the Chinese – all gave money to Bill and Hillary and got favorable treatment in return. It’s a sad day in America when foreign governments with deep pockets have more influence in our own country than our great citizens.” [Revised Aug. 21, 2017]
***
NEW: Jan. 9, 2017: Ukrainian Hacker Goes Dark
On an an encripted, anonymous part of the internet known as the “dark web,” a Ukrainian hacker known as “Profexer” goes completely dark. Three days earlier, the US intelligence agencies’ report on Russian interference with the US election publicly identified a malware program that Profexer wrote as one tool used with Russian hacking in the United States. Sometime thereafter, Profexer turns himself into the Ukrainian police and reportedly begins cooperating with the FBI. [Added Aug. 21, 2017]
***
Feb. 8, 2017: Comey Tells Priebus Not To Meddle
According to a later report in The New York Times, FBI Director Comey has a private meeting at the White House with chief of staff Reince Priebus. He tells Priebus about a Justice Department policy that largely bars discussions between White House officials and the FBI with respect to continuing investigations. The purpose of the policy is to prevent political meddling — or at least the appearance of it — in the bureau’s work, according to the law enforcement official source for the Times report. [Added Aug. 21, 2017]
***
Aug. 1, 2017: White House Admits Trump “Weighed In” On Don Jr.’s Misleading Statement
Responding to reports about Trump’s role in drafting his son’s statement concerning the June 9, 2016 meeting with the Russians, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders says, “The statement that Don Jr. issued is true. There’s no inaccuracy in the statement. The President weighed in as any father would, based on the limited information that he had.” [Added Aug. 21, 2017]
***
NEW: Aug. 14, 2017: Pence Parses His Words On Russia
While visiting a Christian mission in Cartagena, Colombia, Pence tells reporters, “During all of my experience on the campaign, I never witnessed any evidence of collusion or any of the allegations, I’m not aware of that ever having occurred… I made it very clear I am not aware of any contacts during the time that I was on the campaign between any officials of the Russian government and officials with the campaign, and I stand by that.” [Added Aug. 21, 2017]
As for Pence’s awareness of any contacts between Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn and Russian officials prior to the inauguration, Pence adds, “I think I was very clear what I spoke about on television is precisely what Michael Flynn had told me and I believe the president was right to move him out of the White House.” [Added Aug. 21, 2017]
***
NEW: Aug. 15, 2017: Trump Tweets Another Russia Distraction
[Added Aug. 21, 2017]
***
NEW: Aug. 17, 2017: Rohrbacher Echoes Assange: Russia Didn’t Hack Election
A day after meeting with Julian Assange in London, Rep. Dana Rohrbacher (R-CA)—long known in Congress as a fervent defender of Putin and Russia—issues a press release stating that Assange told him Russia was not behind the leaks of emails during the 2016 election. [Added Aug. 21, 2017]
Here’s the link to my appearance with Bill Moyers on Lawrence O’Donnell’s The Last Word.
(Not included in this clip is Rachel Maddow’s generous reference to our Trump/Russia Timeline as an essential tool for journalists. She offered those comments during the segue from her show to O’Donnell’s.)
On Thursday, August 17, 2017, Bill Moyers and I will appear on Lawrence O’Donnell’s “The Last Word.” (MSNBC; 10:00 EDT) We’ll be discussing the Trump/Russia Timeline, Bill Moyers’ recent interview of me, and the Comey firing video.
Meanwhile, here are this week’s Trump/Russia Timeline updates (with additions to the Kushner Timeline, Pence Timeline and Comey Firing Timeline, as appropriate).
1987: Trump’s Early Real Estate Dealings
Trump’s efforts to develop business in Russia date to 1987. In 1996, he visits Moscow with his long-time friend Howard Lorber, an American businessman who, according to Trump, has significant investments in Russia.
There, the two men scout potential locations for a major Trump project. “We are actually looking at something in Moscow right now,” Trump tells The New Yorker a few months later. “And it would be skyscrapers and hotels, not casinos… And we’re working with the local government, the mayor of Moscow and the mayor’s people. So far, they’ve been very responsive.”
The same year as that visit—1996—Trump applies for his trademark in Russia. Discussing ambitions for a Trump hotel in 2007, he declares, “We will be in Moscow at some point.” [Revised Aug. 14, 2017]
June 15, 2013: The Agalarovs Meet with Trump in Las Vegas
Russian real estate oligarch Aras Agalarov and his son, Emin, meet with Donald Trump in Las Vegas, where the Trump-owned Miss USA pageant is being held. [Added Aug. 14, 2017]
Fall 2015: Plans for a Trump Tower in Moscow Put on Hold
According to a Feb. 19, 2017 article in The New York Times citing Felix Sater, Trump’s bid for the presidency brings work on a Trump Tower in Moscow to a halt.
However, in July 2017, Yahoo! News’ Michael Isikoff reports that work with the Agalarovs to build a Trump Tower in Moscow came to a halt because of an economic downturn in Russia that was caused, in part, by sanctions the US and others imposed on Russia in 2014, following its intervention in Ukraine. [Revised Aug. 14, 2017]
JUNE 9, 2016: Don Jr., Manafort, Kushner Meet With Russian Lawyer
Natalia Veselnitskaya, the “Russian government attorney” referenced in Goldstone’s earlier emails to Donald Trump Jr., meets at Trump Tower with Don Jr., Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner.
Veselnitskaya was formerly married to a former deputy transportation minister of the Moscow region. Her clients include state-owned businesses and a senior government official’s son, whose company is under investigation in the United States at the time. According to Reuters, from 2005 to 2013, Veselnitskaya represented successfully the Russian FSB’s interests in a legal dispute over ownership of an upscale property in northwest Moscow. The FSB is the successor to the Soviet-era KGB that Vladimir Putin headed before he became Russian president. Veselnitskaya is also one of the principal players in Russia’s ongoing efforts to eliminate US sanctions that the Magnitsky Act imposes.
Another Russian attendee at the June 9 meeting is Rinat Akhmetshin, a lobbyist reported by some to be a former Soviet intelligence officer, though he denies having ties to Russia’s intelligence agency. Akhmetshin also has been pushing repeal of the Magnitsky Act.
A third attendee is a Russian associate of real estate developer Aras Agalarov, Ike Kaveladze — a vice president for Agalarov’s company focusing on real estate and finance. Born in the Soviet Republic of Georgia, he came to the United States in 1991. In 2000, a congressional inquiry led to a Government Accounting Office report that Kaveladze had set up more than 2,000 corporations in Delaware for Russian brokers and then opened bank accounts for them, without knowing who owned the corporations. According to contemporaneous reporting in The New York Times, “The GAO report said nothing about the sources of the money. In view of past investigations into laundering, this wave was highly likely to have arisen from Russian executives who were seeking to avoid taxes, although some money could be from organized crime… In an interview, Mr. Kaveladze said he had engaged in no wrongdoing. He described the GAO investigation as a ‘witch hunt.’” [Revised Aug. 14, 2017]
March 10, 2017: Trump Fires US Attorney Breet Bharara and 45 Other US Attorneys
Trump fires 46 incumbent US attorneys, leaving in place only Rod Rosenstein of Maryland and Dana Boente of Virginia (who is acting deputy attorney general while Rosenstein’s nomination for that position awaits Senate confirmation).
Trump’s action comes as a surprise to Preet Bharara, the US attorney for the southern district of New York. Shortly after the election, according to Bharara, Trump and Attorney General-designate Jeff Sessions had personally asked Bharara to remain in his position and Bharara had agreed.
At the time of his firing, Bharara is supervising, among other major New York-based investigations, a case allegedly involving Russian money laundering through high-end Manhattan real estate. Bharara’s civil forfeiture action against the Russian defendants involves money allegedly from the $230 million scheme that Sergei Magnitsky had uncovered. The trial is set to begin in May. [Added Aug. 14, 2017]
May 12, 2017: DOJ Settles Russian Money Laundering Case
Three days before the scheduled start of a major Russian money laundering criminal trial in New York federal court, the Justice Department approves settlement of the case for less than $6 million. Allegedly, the action involved a more than $230 million fraud scheme.
Natalia Veselnitskaya — the Russian lawyer who had met with Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner and Paul Manafort on June 9, 2016 — had helped fight the case and reportedly described the settlement as “almost an apology from the government.”
When he announced the filing of the complaint in 2013, then-US Attorney Preet Bharara said, “As alleged, a Russian criminal enterprise sought to launder some of its billions in ill-gotten rubles through the purchase of pricey Manhattan real estate.”
On July 12, 2017, Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee request that the Justice Department provide information about the circumstances surrounding the settlement. [Revised Aug. 14, 2017]
May 14, 2017: Operative Who Searched for Clinton Emails Found Dead
Peter W. Smith is found dead in a Rochester, Minnesota hotel room. The GOP operative from Lake Forest, Illinois, dies about 10 days after an interview with The Wall Street Journal, in which he claimed during the campaign to have connections to Trump adviser Mike Flynn.
Smith had told The Journal that over Labor Day weekend 2016, he began trying to recruit a team of experts to find any emails that were stolen from the private email server that Hillary Clinton used while she was secretary of state.
Smith’s Minnesota state death record says he committed suicide by asphyxiation. The police had recovered a note that included these lines; “NO FOUL PLAY WHATSOEVER” — “RECENT BAD TURN IN HEALTH SINCE JANUARY, 2017” and timing related “TO LIFE INSURANCE OF $5 MILLION EXPIRING.” The Wall Street Journal reporter who had interviewed Smith in May tweets:
[Revised Aug. 14, 2017]
May 26, 2017: Senate Intelligence Committee Demands All Russia Documents From Trump Campaign
The Washington Post reports that the Senate Intelligence Committee has demanded that the Trump campaign produce all Russia-related documents, emails and phone records dating to June 2015, when the campaign was launched. Previously, the committee had asked specific individuals associated with the campaign to produce their documents, and it had asked the campaign itself only to preserve them. [Revised Aug. 14, 2017]
July 25, 2017: Manafort Meets With Senate Intel Committee
Paul Manafort meets with Senate Intelligence Committee investigators about his June 9, 2016 meeting at Trump Tower with Donald Trump, Jr., Jared Kushner, and three Russians. Reportedly, Manafort gives investigators notes he’d taken at the meeting. On the same day, the Senate Judiciary Committee issues and then rescinds a subpoena for Manafort’s appearance on July 26. [Added Aug. 14, 2017]
July 25-27, 2017: Browder Testifies on Putin’s Opposition to Magnitsky Act
In prepared remarks released on July 25—prior to his Senate Judiciary Committee appearance set for July 26 (later rescheduled for July 27)—American financier William Browder discusses the case that, he believes, cost his Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky his life in 2009. Browder explains that repealing the Magnitsky Act and preventing it from spreading to other countries are among Putin’s top foreign policy priorities. He says that two of the Russians attending the June 9, 2016, meeting with Trump’s top campaign advisers were connected to Russian efforts seeking repeal of the Magnitsky Act: lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya and former Soviet intelligence agent Rinat Akhmetshin. [Revised Aug. 14, 2017]
July 26, 2017: FBI Raids Manafort’s Home
At 6:00 am. FBI agents knock on the door of Paul Manafort’s Alexandria, VA home. In a surprise predawn raid, they execute a search warrant. Working with special counsel Robert Mueller, they depart with various records. [Revised Aug. 14, 2017]
July 26, 2017: Trump Tweets a Distraction
[Added Aug. 14, 2017]
Aug. 2, 2017: Trump Denounces New Russian Sanctions, Signs Bill Anyway
In February, Congress had begun to consider legislation that would limit Trump’s ability unilaterally to ease Russian sanctions. Despite ongoing White House objections and lobbying, the final bill had passed the House of Representatives and the Senate with veto-proof majorities. Signing the bill, Trump issues a statement calling the legislation “significantly flawed” and saying the administration “particularly expects the Congress to refrain from using this flawed bill to hinder our important work with European allies to resolve the conflict in Ukraine, and from using it to hinder our efforts to address any unintended consequences it may have for American businesses, our friends or our allies.” In an accompanying press release, Trump says, “Despite its problems, I am signing this bill for the sake of national unity. It represents the will of the American people to see Russia take steps to improve relations with the United States. We hope there will be cooperation between our two countries on major global issues so that these sanctions will no longer be necessary.” [Revised Aug. 14, 2017]
Aug. 4, 2017: Mueller Seeks White House Documents on Flynn and Turkey as Flynn Revises Disclosure Statement
The New York Times reports that investigators working for special counsel Robert Mueller have asked the White House for documents relating to former national security adviser Mike Flynn and have questioned witnesses about whether he might have secretly received payments from Turkey during the final months of the campaign.
The Times also reports that earlier in the week, Flynn had filed a third version of his required financial disclosure form. The most recent filing added his contract with SCL Group—the parent company of Cambridge Analytica, a data-mining firm that worked with the Trump campaign—and increased his reported income from $1.4 million to $1.8 million. [Added Aug. 14, 2017]
Aug. 6, 2017: Conway Calls June 9, 2016 Meeting and Russia Investigation “Nothing”
On ABC’s This Week, counselor to the president Kellyanne Conway calls the June 9, 2016 meeting among Trump’s top advisers Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, Paul Manafort and the Russians “ridiculous” and “nothing.” She refuses to answer whether Trump will commit to not firing special counsel Robert Mueller. “There’s nothing in this Russia investigation,” she says. [Added Aug. 14, 2017]
Sometimes, a client isn’t worth the billable hours it brings to the firm. But long ago, Upton Sinclair revealed why some big law firm partners don’t accept that truism: “It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”
Except when a court appoints an attorney for a defendant who can’t afford one, lawyers choose their clients. In most firms, partners “eat-what-they-kill.” The resulting culture creates short-term incentives that cause business development efforts to focus on a single question: How much revenue will the prospective client generate?
Sheri Dillon, William Nelson, and their firm, Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, are teaching the profession an important lesson: such myopia is a mistake.
Sliding Down Trump’s Slippery Slope
In 2016, candidate Trump was pushing a flimsy “under audit” excuse for not releasing tax his returns. On March 7, 2016, Dillon and Nelson signed a letter confirming that, in fact, Trump’s tax returns for 2002 through 2008 were no longer under audit. However, the letter explained, his returns for 2009 forward “are continuations of prior, closed examinations.” Needless to say, Americans will never see those returns—at least, not because Trump releases them voluntarily. But Trump used Morgan Lewis to suit his immediate public relations needs.
In a Jan. 11, 2017 press conference, Dillon, Nelson and their firm took a more prominent role in Trump’s circus. They unveiled a plan to deal with Trump’s business conflicts of interest made a mockery of American presidential ethics. Attorneys were quick to condemn it. Subsequent events have demonstrated that the plan remains useless in preserving the integrity of the presidency.
By April, even reliable stalwart Trump defender Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) wanted to know what Trump was doing to implement his attorneys’ earlier public promises. On May 24, The New York Times reported the Trump Organization’s response: a slick brochure explaining why it was impractical to comply “fully and completely” with Sheri Dillon’s earlier assurance that Trump would donate to the US Treasury all profits from Trump hotels and similar businesses derived from foreign governments.
Recently, The Washington Post summarized just one of small slice of the ongoing scandal: “This is nothing Washington has ever seen. For the first time in presidential history, a profit-making venture [the Trump International Hotel in DC] touts the name of a U.S. president in its gold signage. And every cup of coffee served, every fundraiser scheduled, every filet mignon ordered feeds the revenue of the Trump family’s private business.”
“I Put Out a Letter”… (from somebody)
The most recent hit to the reputations of Sheri Dillon, William Nelson, and their firm came during Trump’s now infamous July 19, 2017 interview with The New York Times. Reporters asked him what would happen if special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation included Trump and Trump family finances unrelated to Russia. Would that be would a breach of Mueller’s charge?
“I would say yeah,” Trump answered. “I would say yes. By the way, I would say, I don’t — I don’t — I mean, it’s possible there’s a condo or something, so, you know, I sell a lot of condo units, and somebody from Russia buys a condo, who knows? I don’t make money from Russia. In fact, I put out a letter saying that I don’t make — from one of the most highly respected law firms, accounting firms.”
Trump’s last remark referred to the March 8, 2017 letter that Dillon and Nelson had signed. But he couldn’t even remember whether Morgan Lewis was a firm of attorneys or accountants.
Substantively, the March 8 letter had actually raised far more questions than it answered. It even seemed to rebut Trump’s prior denials of income from Russia. Dillon and Nelson stated that “with a few exceptions”—totaling about $100 million—Trump’s tax returns for the past 10 years “do not reflect” any “income from Russian sources,” “debt owed by you or [The Trump Organization] to Russian lenders,” “equity investments by Russian persons or entities,” or “equity or debt investments by you or [The Trump Organization] in Russian entities.”
Among notable omissions were: the definition of “Russian”; whether Russian funds flowed into Trump projects more than 10 years ago; whether money from other former Soviet-bloc countries made its way into Trump projects; and what, if anything, Morgan Lewis had done to determine whether individuals or entities from Russia, Ukraine, or other former Soviet-bloc countries used shell corporations for transactions involving Trump businesses.
And Then There’s This
Investigative reporters—who aren’t Trump’s lawyers—have discovered that, since the 1990’s, tens of millions of dollars from former Soviet-bloc countries have found their way into Trump projects as investments, construction financing, and condominium purchases. No one outside Trump’s immediate orbit—except, perhaps, Vladimir Putin—knows the full extent to which that money contributed to his current fortune.
But there are clues. In September 2008, Donald Trump Jr. told a real estate conference: “In terms of high-end product influx into the US, Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets; say in Dubai, and certainly with our project in SoHo and anywhere in New York. We see a lot of money pouring in from Russia. There’s indeed a lot of money coming for new-builds and resale reflecting a trend in the Russian economy and, of course, the weak dollar versus the ruble.”
Trump’s Reward
The fact that Trump couldn’t recall whether Sheri Dillon, William Nelson, and their firm practiced law or accounting is the least of their problems now. Trump has elevated the Dillon/Nelson/Morgan Lewis letter to a new status: evidence that the Russia investigation is a hoax. Depending on how special counsel Robert Mueller proceeds, those involved in preparing and signing that letter may need lawyers, too.
Other prominent law firms appear to have learned from the Morgan Lewis experience. In June 2017, Michael Isikoff reported that when Trump sought to bolster his legal team, four of the nation’s leading firms refused:
“The concerns were, ‘The guy won’t pay and he won’t listen,’ said one lawyer close to the White House who is familiar with some of the discussions between the firms and the administration, as well as deliberations within the firms themselves.”
Even if Dillon, Nelson, and Morgan Lewis have hedged the “won’t pay” problem by requiring a big retainer from their famous client, it won’t compensate for the potential impact on their professional reputations. And like all nightmare clients, Trump couldn’t care less about that.
