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Follow The Money!

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Detective-looking guy following dollar signs embedded in pavement to St. Basil’s Cathedral, just across Red Square from the Kremlin

Following the money is difficult and tedious. Each story is detailed, and the stories appear at different times, later overshadowed by the next Trump scandal. In this post, I collect instances of Russian-associated money going into Republican coffers.

There aren’t enough instances to connect into a pattern beyond that theme, although some names occur in more than one example. I hope reporters will see this as a fertile path forward. Foreign money is prohibited in US political campaigns, but there are ways to get around that.

There are probably more – add them in the comments, preferably with a link, if you have them.

Rusal Aluminum Rolling Mill in Kentucky

Shortly after sanctions against Russia were lifted in early 2019, Rusal, a Russian metals company in which Oleg Deripaska has an interest, announced that it would participate in building an aluminum rolling mill in Ashland, Kentucky. Mitch McConnell, of course, is from Kentucky. (Washington Post, New York Times)

Dallas Morning News, Updated May 2018

Donations from several Russian-associated American citizens to campaigns of Mitch McConnell, Marco Rubio, and Lindsey Graham are documented. The donors are Len Blavatnik, Andrew Intrater, Alexander Shustorovich, and Simon Kukes. There are connections among them and to Rusal, in which Blavatnik holds a 20.5% stake with Viktor Vekselberg. Blavatnik gave $6.35 million to GOP political action committees in 2015-2016, including $2 million from one of his companies to McConnell’s PAC.

Vekselberg is the president of the Renova Group, a Russian conglomerate with interests in aluminum, energy, and other sectors. Intrater is the chief executive of Columbus Nova, Renova’s US investment arm.

Shustorovich, chief executive of IMG Artists, attempted to give the Republican Party $250K in 2000 to support the Bush campaign, but his money was rejected because of his ties to the Russian government. $1 million to Trump’s Inaugural Committee.

From 1998 to 2003, Kukes worked for Vekselberg and Blavatnik. He contributed a total of $283K, much of it to the Trump Victory Fund. He had no significant donor history before that election.

Steven Mnuchin owned a Hollywood financing company with Blavatnik until he sold his stake to accept Trump’s appointment as Treasury Secretary.

The Citizens United decision made these contributions legal.

A quote from the May 17, 2017, Washington Post:

A month before Donald Trump clinched the Republican nomination, one of his closest allies in Congress — House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy — made a politically explosive assertion in a private conversation on Capitol Hill with his fellow GOP leaders: that Trump could be the beneficiary of payments from Russian President Vladimir Putin.

“There’s two people I think Putin pays: Rohrabacher and Trump,” McCarthy (R-Calif.) said, according to a recording of the June 15, 2016, exchange, which was listened to and verified by The Washington Post. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher is a Californian Republican known in Congress as a fervent defender of Putin and Russia.

House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) immediately interjected, stopping the conversation from further exploring McCarthy’s assertion, and swore the Republicans present to secrecy….

News had just broken the day before in The Washington Post that Russian government hackers had penetrated the computer network of the Democratic National Committee, prompting McCarthy to shift the conversation from Russian meddling in Europe to events closer to home.

Some of the lawmakers laughed at McCarthy’s comment. Then McCarthy quickly added: “Swear to God.”

Ryan instructed his Republican lieutenants to keep the conversation private, saying: “No leaks. . . . This is how we know we’re a real family here.”

Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman

Kevin McCarthy has said he will donate to charity funds totaling about $185,000 received from Rudy Giuliani associates Lev Parnas and Igor Fruman. His campaign organizations received the money just before McCarthy called for US Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovich to be removed from her job. Parnas and Fruman have received some of their money from Dmytro Firtash, who is in Austria, fighting extradition to the US on bribery charges and has been a front man for the Kremlin in attempting to gain control of Ukrainian natural gas supplies. Giuliani, who Trump says is his lawyer, has accepted money from Parnas and Fruman. Investigation continues.

Michael Cohen and Essential Consultants Inc.

Columbus Nova, mentioned in the Dallas Morning News article, paid $500,000 to Michael Cohen’s shell company, Essential Consultants Inc. That company was the vehicle for paying hush money to one of Donald Trump’s mistresses. Viktor Vekselberg and Andrew Intrater were involved. Cohen was the treasurer of the Republican Party, and this payment may have been made while he was in that post.

National Rifle Association (NRA)

The NRA has been closely associated with the Republican Party in fighting limitations on gun ownership. Maria Butina infiltrated the organization as a Russian agent, establishing “lines of communication to advance Russian interests.” An 18-month investigation by the Senate Finance Committee’s Democratic staff found that the NRA supported Butina’s activities and those of her supervisor, Alexander Torshin in setting up a trip for NRA executives to travel to Russia with the expectation of enhancing their personal business activities. Such use of a nonprofit’s funds is illegal.

Counterintelligence Investigation

A counterintelligence investigation into Russian influence in the 2016 election preceded the Mueller investigation, was folded into it, and still continues. We need to hear more from that investigation. That investigation may have turned up the hacking of the Republican National Committee by Russians, from which no information has been leaked.

Hotel in Azerbaijan and Iran’s Revolutionary Guard

This money in this story is not Russian, but rather from the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. The Trump organization may have laundered money for the Revolutionary Guard through a hotel built in Baku, Azerbaijan. The New Yorker’s Adam Davidson did the investigation and has been trying to get the attention of other media on Twitter, given the current hostilities with Iran. Here’s one of his Twitter threads.

Not money, but it might be useful to cross-check the 16 times that Trump has spoken privately with Vladimir Putin.

Paul Manafort worked for Deripaska and owed him millions of dollars.

This may not be a full listing of Russian money going to Republican candidates and organizations. If you have other examples, add them in the comments, preferably with links.

Russia is not a friend of the United States, so one might ask a number of questions. Why are Republicans willing to accept Russian money? Is there similar evidence for Democrats? The account in the Dallas Morning News says that they are reporting on “99% Republican donations.” Does this money influence officeholders’ opinions and votes?

Seems important to me.

Image source

Cross-posted to Nuclear Diner

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What Is This “Re-Establish Deterrence” They Keep Talking About?

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I have a short piece up at Inkstick Media. It’s short enough that I won’t quote it here, except to say that I have found the claims that the Trump administration killed Qassem Soleimani to “re-establish deterrence” annoying in multiple dimensions.

Besides, Inkstick is a new enterprise, trying to make this stuff more understandable, and I support that goal. If you like what I write here, you’ll probably like Inkstick. Go ahead, give them some clicks!

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The Media Take A Few Small Steps

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It seems to me that I’ve been seeing some small movement of the media toward honest coverage. More people (not necessarily media) are speaking out about media failures to cover politics in an age when one of our political parties has gone full propaganda.

Jamelle Bouie has an outstanding column in the New York Times, “The Trump We Did Not Want To See.” He argues that the reality of the Trump presidency is so abnormal that journalists’ minds recoil. I find this convincing, because when I write some of my tweets or posts I can feel my mind recoiling. You can see it when people say “This is not my America.”

But yes, it is our America today. We may change it next November, or Congress may change it before then, but if we are to deal with what we have, we must look it in the eye. Read the whole thing.

Dan Froomkin has a kit of background facts that reporters should use to give context to Trump comments. It’s very good and simple enough that reporters might use it.

Margaret Sullivan suggests that “The media should spotlight a different kind of war expert: Those who voted ‘no’ on Iraq” rather than OMG Judy Miller and Joe Lieberman. She’s good, as usual.

Fareed Zakharia is saying it out loud.

Trump does not have a foreign policy. He has a series of impulses — isolationism, unilateralism, bellicosity — some of them contradictory. One might surge at any particular moment, triggered usually by Trump’s sense that he might look weak or foolish. They are often unleashed without any consultation, and then his yes men line up to defend him, supporting the president’s every move with North Korean-style enthusiasm, no matter how incoherent.

And John Kerry is calling a liar a liar.

A few small steps. It’s a long slog, and we need to keep pounding on the journalists and our congresscritters.

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Iran Fires On US Airbase

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Things are still happening. Here’s a selection of tweets.

I’ll add more in the comments as they show up.

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Iran’s Action On The Nuclear Agreement

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A lot of claims are flying around about Iran’s actions with regard to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. Some things are not yet clear. Here’s the official statement and interpretation by Mehr News:

“The Islamic Republic of Iran, in the fifth step in reducing its commitments, discards the last key component of its operational limitations in the JCPOA, which is the “limit on the number of centrifuges.”

As such, the Islamic Republic of Iran’s nuclear program no longer faces any operational restrictions, including enrichment capacity, percentage of enrichment, amount of enriched material, and research and development.

From here on, Iran’s nuclear program will be developed solely based on its technical needs.

Iran’s cooperation with the IAEA will continue as before.

If the sanctions are lifted and Iran benefits from its interests enshrined in the JCPOA, the Islamic Republic is ready to return to its commitments.

The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) is obliged to take the necessary steps and arrangements in coordination with the President.”

US President Donald Trump unilaterally pulled Washington out of the JCPOA in May 2018, and reimposed “toughest ever” sanctions against the Islamic Republic in defiance of global criticism.

In response to the US unilateral move, as well as the European signatories’ failure to safeguard Iran’s economic interests in the face of US sanctions, Tehran rowed back on its nuclear commitments step-by-step in compliance with Articles 26 and 36 of the JCPOA, but stressed that its retaliatory measures will be reversible as soon as Europe finds practical ways to shield the mutual trade from the US sanctions.

As a first step, Iran increased its enriched uranium stockpile to beyond the 300 kilograms set by the JCPOA.

In the second step, Tehran began enriching uranium to purity rates beyond the JCPOA limit of 3.76 percent.

In the third phase, after the Europeans failed to meet a 60-day deadline to meet Iran’s demands and fulfill their commitments under the deal, Iran started up advanced centrifuges to boost the country’s stockpile of enriched uranium and activated 20 IR-4 and 20 IR-6 centrifuges for research and development purposes.

In November, Iran began injecting gas into centrifuges at the Fordow plant as part of its fourth step away from the JCPOA under the supervision of the IAEA.

Iran will continue to cooperate with IAEA inspections. This is important, because it keep us informed of what is happening in Iran’s nuclear complex. Iran remains within the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, which is their commitment not to build nuclear weapons.

Worth requoting from above:

If the sanctions are lifted and Iran benefits from its interests enshrined in the JCPOA, the Islamic Republic is ready to return to its commitments.

This has been Iran’s position all along. They have acted in a measured and predictable way. In fact, they have done less than they might have; a number of experts expected today’s announcement to be that they were enriching uranium up to 20% U-235, which would have been worse than that they are removing limits on numbers of centrifuges.

There are fine points that are still not clear, like what will happen to the Arak reactor and to the international cooperation they have been participating in to convert their nuclear installations to peaceful use.

Here are the initial tweets in a couple of threads from people involved in the negotiations and implementation of the JCPOA. Worth reading in full.

 

Cross-posted to Nuclear Diner

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Moving Into The New Year With Molotov And Ribbentrop

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In 1939, the Soviet Union formally allied with Nazi Germany and agreed on how to split up the countries located between them. Immediately after, Germany invaded Poland. It is generally thought to be the beginning of World War II. Russia did not acknowledge the existence of the secret protocol on dividing Europe until 1989.

Cartoon by David Low in the Evening Standard depicting Hitler greeting Stalin after the invasion of Poland, 

But that is not what Vladimir Putin wants you to believe. No, it was dastardly France, United Kingdom, the United States, and others who joined up with Hitler first at Munich, leaving the poor Soviet Union with no choice! Putin has mentioned this in several speeches, and in the last several weeks, Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has joined in.

And they’re dissing diplomats who disagree with them.

The nations Russia has accused of starting World War II are pushing back.

Even Germany…

And, of course, a lot more from amateur and professional historians on Twitter. If you ever wanted to learn more about the beginnings of World War II, this is your big chance.

It’s hard to know what is motivating this propaganda storm from Russia. Here’s a person I trust.

That’s a little unclear, but I think the second sentence is intended to say that when Russia wants to use WW2 to gain friends, it usually talks about its sacrifices rather than the war’s origins.

There is speculation, as you see in the Dalsjö tweet, that it’s in preparation for some sort of military action from Russia. I tend to doubt that – Russia doesn’t need that kind of trouble right now. OTOH, Putin has been feeling cocky about his new weapons designed to deter the United States.

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Long Read: The 84-Day Hold On Aid To Ukraine

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This is an important article. The broad story it tells isn’t new: Donald Trump held back Congressionally appropriated funds for Ukraine, in contravention of law and recommdations by the Departments of Defense and State. What is new is the detail of how that was done, an attempted legal justification, and who was eager to help him.

News reports about the administration now usually give information about the sources the reports are based on. In this case, it was

Interviews with dozens of current and former administration officials, congressional aides and others, previously undisclosed emails and documents, and a close reading of thousands of pages of impeachment testimony[.]

Here’s a short summary. Lots more details in the article. Basically, Trump decided to withhold the money; White House lawyers tried to construct a justification; civil servants and even some of Trump’s appointees tried to talk him out of it; his messenger boys went to the departments to work it out; and, when the whistle was blown, Trump gave it up. All this time, Rudy Giuliani was meeting with Ukrainian officials and others; this was not known to all participants at the time.

Robert Blair, Assistant to the President and Senior Advisor to Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney, was a key player along with Mulvaney. Mulvaney brought him along when he moved to the White House. On December 23, he was named Special Representative for International Telecommunications Policy, although he will also continue to serve in his previous role.

On June 19, Blair called Russell T. Vought, the acting head of the Office of Management and Budget, and told him to hold up the aid. Trying to understand the reason for the holdup, Vought’s staff searched the internet and found an article in the Washington Examiner that might have set off the President. In a normal White House, a decision like this would have been made in consultation with experts from the Departments of State, Defense, and Treasury. In fact, State and Defense had already certified sending the funds to Ukraine as appropriate.

The career official in the budget office in charge of the funds was Mark Sandy. He phoned other officials in the budget office and Defense Department to try to understand what was happening. It was not a normal request. He was concerned that it might violate the Impoundment Control Act, which prohibits the President from holding up money Congress has appropriated.

A month later, on July 18, William Taylor, acting Ambassador to Ukraine, and other officials learned about the hold in a meeting. Taylor testified to Congress that he was astonished. On the same day, administration sources called four Congressional staffers and urged that they look into the hold.

A week later, Trump famously telephoned Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelinsky and asked for a favor. Ninety minutes after the call, the budget office sent an email to the Pentagon saying not to spend the money. Ukrainian officials were beginning to get word that something was up.

In late July, Sandy’s authority over the funds was removed and given to his boss, a political appointee. Defense Department officials were becoming impatient. Deadlines were approaching by which portions of the money had to be spent, or it would be lost.

Backed by a memo saying the National Security Council, the Pentagon and the State Department all wanted the aid released, Mr. Bolton made a personal appeal to Mr. Trump on Aug. 16, but was rebuffed.

On Aug. 28, Politico published a story reporting that the assistance to Ukraine had been frozen. After more than two months, the issue, the topic of fiery internal debate, was finally public.

Mr. Bolton’s relationship with the president had been deteriorating for months, and he would leave the White House weeks later, but on this front he had powerful internal allies.

On a sunny, late-August day, Mr. Bolton, Mr. Esper and Mr. Pompeo arrayed themselves around the Resolute desk in the Oval Office to present a united front, the leaders of the president’s national security team seeking to convince him face to face that freeing up the money for Ukraine was the right thing to do.

Through this time, White House lawyers were trying to develop a legal justification for the hold. Then came the whistleblower’s report, at the end of August. Shortly after, the hold was lifted.

Many questions remain unanswered, like who knew about Giuliani’s activities and when they knew; how long the shakedown was in progress before the hold; and how Trump came to his ideas about Ukraine. Once again, it was civil servants who tried to hold firm against inappropriate actions.

In addition to Trump’s corrupt use of government funds to force Zelensky into helping his election campaign, holding up those funds and causing uncertainty in the Ukrainian government benefits Russia.

The specifics in this article will be helpful in making a case that Mulvaney and other officials must be called as witnesses in the Senate impeachment trial.

Cross-posted to Nuclear Diner

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North Korea’s Christmas Present

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Back in May, I argued that Donald Trump’s tactic toward North Korea would be to pretend he didn’t hear what was happening as long as he could. I call the tactic “LALALALALA I can’t hear you” and tweet that with news that Trump is keeping it going.

It’s a dangerous tactic, and a number of my national security colleagues have been raising concerns about it. Kim Jong Un has set a deadline of the end of the year for…something. He hasn’t said exactly what, but he has been testing missiles, and his officials have been making unfriendly statements. Kim has said that he is not waiting for the end of the year and has a “Christmas present” for Trump.

Trump’s response so far: LALALALALA and a couple of “Rocket man” tweets. He continues to say that his good friend Kim would not violate the “strong deal” they agreed on in Singapore.

The Singapore statement commits neither North Korea nor the United States to any actions. At most, it might be said to be a statement of principles. And it contains the phrase “complete denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula,” which, to North Korea, means a vague future in which the United States leaves South Korea so that the North feels safe enough to give up its nuclear weapons. Trump and his Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, use the phrase to mean that North Korea must give up its nuclear weapons before they will even discuss lifting sanctions.

The phrase has historically been used in its North Korean meaning, so they have the better of that argument.

Meanwhile, Donald Trump has been threatening the South Korean government. In late November, he demanded that South Korea pay five times what it has been for the presence of American troops in that country. In response, South Korea threatened to end intelligence cooperation with the United States and Japan, but backed away from that threat. Although Trump has focused more on his impeachment since then, his demand for more money from South Korea is consistent with his misunderstandings of how alliances work and their benefits to the United States. If he continues to insist on that payment, he will lessen his leverage for negotiating with North Korea.

North Korea has been testing missiles throughout the year. They recently did an engine test that could be for an ICBM that could reach the United States or for a satellite launch. The test was different in a number of ways from earlier tests, but satellite photos of the site don’t contain enough information to fully diagnose it.

All these threads could dovetail in the next few weeks. The negotiations with North Korea are going nowhere, although Special Envoy Stephen Biegun has optimistically suggested he’s ready to meet. North Korea has said that that time has passed. They are getting ready for what they hope will be an impressive weapons test, more likely missile than nuclear.

A further complication has just appeared. China and Russia have drafted a United Nations Security Council resolution that proposes that the Security Council lift sanctions on North Korean exports of seafood and textiles. It also proposes lifting the ban on North Korean workers abroad and would terminate a 2017 requirement that all North Korean workers be repatriated by next week. If the resolution goes to a vote, it will put the US in a difficult position. If the US vetoes, we are the bad guys. If we allow it through, the result is worse than the offer Trump refused at Hanoi.

Trump and Pompeo have shown no sign of movement from the position that North Korea must disarm itself of its nuclear weapons before they will even talk. What Biegun has said so far does not contradict that.

How long can Trump continue with LALALALALA I can’t hear you? We may find out in the next two weeks.

Cross-posted at Nuclear Diner

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Thou Shalt Not Criticize The Dear Leader

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To celebrate NATO’s 70th birthday, the Danish Atlantic Council, a thinktank, arranged a conference to be held on December 10. The American Ambassador to Denmark was invited to be an organizer. The lineup of speakers was pretty much as one might expect.

The Ambassador insisted that one of the speakers be removed from the program: Stanley Sloan, a visiting professor at Middlebury College, fellow at the Atlantic Council and former CIA analyst. Sloan has been critical of President Donald Trump. The Danish Atlantic Council has now canceled the entire conference.

The paper Sloan intended to present can be found here. In it, he talks about internal and external threats to NATO. The internal threats are largely, but not entirely, Donald Trump, which is what the news has been telling us through last week’s NATO meeting. Others of his papers can be found here.

The Ambassador, Carla Sands,

is a former actress, chiropractor, and board member of major California institutions who was confirmed to her post in 2017 after making contributions to Trump’s campaign and inauguration and, according to ProPublica, being recommended by Eliott Broidy. Her official Twitter account looks much like any other ambassador’s, while her personal account is often retweets of articles from far-right outlets like Breitbart and Prager University.

David Frum (yes, I know, but he’s got this right) checked out her Twitter account, with screenshots because he figures the account will be deleted or cleaned up. There’s a lot more to the thread; this is just a sample.

The Trump administration keeps pushing the boundaries. Earlier in that thread, Frum points out that his participation in conferences was never censored by the government. That’s been the policy until this Dear Leader and his far-right minions.

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