That old line ain’t working anymore
You are just being silly now but have a nice day
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by seemslikeadream » Fri Sep 27, 2019 8:53 am
by seemslikeadream » Fri Sep 27, 2019 8:54 am
Trump Campaign Chief Outlines $1 Billion Strategy For 2020 On Trip To Romania
Tudor MihailescuContributor
Entrepreneurs
plans to use 1.6 million volunteers in a data-driven, large-scale ground game operation to win the next Presidential election
The odds are we’re gonna spend a billion US dollars on this campaign.
Brad Parscale, 2020 campaign manager for President Donald Trump (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
Brad Parscale, 2020 campaign manager for President[+]
ASSOCIATED PRESS
In the days preceding the official conclusion of the Mueller Report, Brad Parscale, Trump’s campaign manager, was on a trip to Romania, where he outlined a $1 billion dollar strategy to get the U.S. President re-elected in 2020.
Parscale’s visit was received with great public interest in this mostly pro-American country located on the European Union’s Eastern border. Officially appointed at the helm of Trump’s 2020 re-election efforts in 2018, Parscale had previously been in charge of the candidate’s digital marketing efforts during the 2016 campaign.
Parscale delivered a talk on Thursday at the Romanian Academy with the title “Let’s Make Political Marketing Great Again” in the presence of numerous personalities of Romania’s political and academic elite. “This is the farthest East I’ve ever gone in my life today in Romania”, Parscale confessed during the event. In this unlikely context so far from home, he shared fascinating details about the Trump campaign’s plans to use 1.6 million volunteers in a data-driven, large-scale ground game operation to win the next Presidential election . During his three-day stay in Bucharest, Parscale also gave an extended public interview in prime time on a popular TV news station and met with various local business and political leaders.
The 500-pound gorilla
Parscale’s journey of twists and turns to working for the world’s most powerful leader is a classic American dream story. He was born in a small town in Eastern Kansas, “where my friends were lucky to become tow truck drivers or even get to college”. Parscale earned a basketball scholarship to the University of Texas at San Antonio and went on to work for a tech company that went bust during the dot-com crash. When he landed his first contract with the Trump organization in 2011, he was running a small marketing business in San Antonio. With no prior experience in politics, Parscale built Donald Trump’s first campaign website for as little as $1,500 in 2015. Back then, “I’m nobody, you know, the guy at Walgreens didn’t remember me and I go there every week”, he told the Romanian conference attendees. Today, he is widely credited with a key role in tipping the odds to Trump’s favour during the 2016 race by pushing the campaign to spend half of its advertising budget online.
“You’re talking to people on Twitter, but you know what you’re missing? The 500 pound gorilla that’s ready for the picking. Who controls Facebook controls the 2016 election”, Parscale recalls telling Trump’s team the day
he got hired as digital campaign manager for the primary. He understood better than anyone that Facebook held the key to engaging the “lost, forgotten people of America”. “Millions of Americans, older people, are on the internet, watching pictures of their kids because they all moved to cities … if we can connect to them, we can change this election”.
Individual ad targeting
During the primary, Parscale operated Trump’s digital marketing strategy by himself “on the couch” of his San Antonio home. But that changed substantially when his boss secured the GOP nomination. And so did the campaign’s approach to voter targeting. The Trump team gained access to the Republican National Committee’s Data Trust, a collection of more than 200 million voter files gathered through a massive operation begun in the wake of Romney’s 2012 Presidential defeat. It was like a “Christmas present”, Parscale remembers. The team now had a way to “know what Americans think”. But Parscale and his team still needed an efficient way to target them. “And this other Christmas present showed up: these guys from Facebook walked to my office and said: ‘we have a beta … it’s a new onboarding tool … you can onboard audiences straight into Facebook and we will match them to their Facebook accounts’”. The tool had 97-98% match rates, Parscale told a riveted audience at the Romanian Academy of Sciences. This allowed Trump’s team to revolutionize the use of micro-targeting in the 2016 campaign:
Hillary Clinton’s team made 66 thousand visual ads. My team made 5.9 million ads. Those are ads targeted directly to people the way they want to consume them. I stopped looking at people as demographics, groups, personas. I said: let’s look at people as individuals, how do they act. Because two people who look the same, might act differently.
“That is the future of political marketing”, Parscale argues. His team is relying on this strategy again in the run-up to the 2020 election. CNN reports that in 2019 the Trump campaign has already spent $3.5 million on Facebook ads.
1.6 million volunteers
However, Parscale realizes that digital campaigning won’t be enough to win this time. So, “we’re starting to build the largest ground game operation in history”, he announced on Thursday.
In 2016, we had 700,000 volunteers help us. In 2020, we’re gonna have 1.6 million volunteers. I had 3,000 team leaders across the United States. This time we’ll have 90,000 team leaders.
The tests the Trump campaign ran show that door-to-door campaigning is conducive to much better approval ratings for specific policies than online advertising. “Trying to explain the First Step Act in prison reform in a tweet or Facebook post is not easy”, Parscale explains. What it takes is “somebody walking on your door and saying: ‘hey, let me tell you about how this policy the President has implemented fixes this problem in your area’”.
I asked Parscale during the Q&A session how they’re going to coordinate campaign communication on such a large scale. “What we need to do is create technology, an app on your phone”, which “will help execute any type of volunteer programs and what we need to do, once we have data back”, he answered. The volunteer app would be powered by and feed into the campaign’s data-gathering operation through the use of a large scale machine learning system. So, when knocking on a door, the team already knows what issues the person cares about, and the takeaways from their discussion will help improve the campaign’s advertising program.
Brad Parscale with anchor Mihai Gadea before interview for popular Romanian talk show “Sinteza Zilei”
Brad Parscale with anchor Mihai Gadea before [+]
ANTENA 3
Voter Prospecting
Voter prospecting is “the second big thing in terms of 2020 that’s going to change American politics”, Parscale said. “Think if I had the email address and phone number of every single person who could vote for Donald Trump before the election”. The campaign is spending $2 million a month doing exactly that, Parscale shared during the conference. Back in 2015, “the most people [the Republican National Committee] could contact to show up [to vote] without using television, advertising or some kind of mass media was 2 million people”. By 2020, “we’re gonna have 50-60 million. That’s a change in mentality”, Parscale emphasized. Why is this so important? “In United States for election you only need about 62 million people”. So, around the election, the Republicans will use this massive database to message and call their prospective voters to say: “it’s time for you to show up and vote for what you already saw”. And “that’s a gigantic advantage, because the democrats can’t do that”, Parscale added during his TV interview. He then went on to announce:
The odds are we’re gonna spend a billion US dollars on this campaign.
The level of organization and massive proportions of the Trump re-election campaign operation raised gasps of astonishment among the audience at the Romanian Academy as much as it raises concerns within the Democratic National Committee about how to match the effort. But this data-gathering race raises a more fundamental question about individuals’ privacy rights in the digital democracy age: what is the cut-off point where maximizing the efficiency of citizen engagement mechanisms makes voters more vulnerable rather than more informed? Both campaigns should take this consideration seriously on the road to 2020.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/tudormihai ... ssion=true
by seemslikeadream » Fri Sep 27, 2019 8:55 am
seemslikeadream » Fri Sep 27, 2019 6:32 am wrote:So what do you believe Biden’s role is
Hint he has nothing to do with this except in trump’s mind and Goolinani’s ass.......trying to enlist a foreign government to interfere in U.S. elections
Rudy Giuliani, the U.S. President’s “informal” Cybersecurity Advisor, was negotiating clandestine foreign policy deals in Ukraine for the obvious benefit of Donald Trump.
Btw kinda illegalPortlus Glam
@PortlusGlam
NEW FROM ME-->
ROGUE AGENT: How Rudy Giuliani got paid by the Government of Ukraine to influence U.S. foreign policy
Since 2017, Giuliani has earned $14M money from foreign gov'ts, oligarchs, & unknown others while negotiating quid-pro-quo deals for Trump.
https://mobile.twitter.com/PortlusGlam/ ... 5874973697
ROGUE AGENT: How Rudy Giuliani got paid by the Government of Ukraine to influence U.S. foreign policy
Giuliani represents himself abroad as “Advisor” to the U.S. President, negotiating quid-pro-quo deals with foreign governments while earning at least $14 million in “consulting” fees since 2017. Why isn’t he registered as a foreign agent?
Portlus Glam
Follow
Sep 26 · 8 min read
Reporting by: Portlus Glam
With research from: @agenthades1 @mopeng @brazencapital @arapaho415 @msmariat @SaysDana @itssuzann @macfinn44 @DerWouter @RighteousBabe4 @ItIsIMack @kelly2277 @mrspanstreppon @Stephaniefishm4 @WendySiegelman @patrickLSimpson
In May 2018, I began alerting reporters to an issue I found to be of urgent national security concern — Rudy Giuliani, the U.S. President’s “informal” Cybersecurity Advisor, was negotiating clandestine foreign policy deals in Ukraine for the obvious benefit of Donald Trump.
Open source research had revealed unequivocally that beginning in early 2017, Giuliani began receiving payments from the Ukrainian Government under cover of “security consulting” contracts with two cities. First, Kharkiv — a Party of Regions stronghold in the country’s east headed by Mayor Gennadiy Kernes. The other, Kiev — Ukraine’s capital city headed by Mayor Viktor Klitschko. Simultaneously, Giuliani was “advising” or otherwise engaging with officials at the highest levels of the U.S. government to influence U.S. policy and create favorable outcomes for his Ukrainian clients.
These quid-pro-quo deals in Ukraine were lucrative for Giuliani. In divorce court proceedings last year, it was revealed that Trump’s advisor had earned at least $14 million from foreign governments, oligarchs, and unknown others. Since Trump was elected, foreign officials have cared little whether Giuliani is “formally” in his role — they care about access and the ability to influence the U.S. President’s policy decisions. Since January 2017, Giuliani has delivered in spades.
When Department of Homeland Security Advisor Tom Bossert announced the administration’s first Executive Order on cybersecurity in May 2017, it was Giuliani who he thanked for its development.
When then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson announced he was shuttering the Office of Cyber Issues in July 2017, it was Giuliani whose team was on the ground in Kharkiv discussing U.S.-Ukraine “security cooperation”.
When Trump green lit the Pentagon’s Javelin missile proposal in November 2017 — after months of “stalling” — it was Giuliani who arrived in Ukraine on the private jet of Ukrainian-American oligarch Alexander Rovt.
It was Giuliani who promised Mayor Kernes a special “support office” for Kharkiv in the U.S.
It was Giuliani who met with then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko to discuss “Russian aggression” and corruption reform.
And once the administration approved the shipment of Javelin missiles to Ukraine in March 2018 — it was Giuliani who hosted a delegation from Kharkiv to “study” the New York and New Jersey Departments of Emergency Management and discuss “software issues” related to the U.S. Center for Emergency Response.
From Left to Right: (?), Ukranian President Petro Poroshenko, (?), CEO of Giuliani Safety and Security John Huvane, Rudy Giuliani, and Denis Berman (father of TriGlobal Stategic Ventures Partner Josh Berman)
Over the past eighteen months, I have written five articles and posted countless research threads documenting Giuliani’s foreign travels and illegal activities in Ukraine. At various points, I’ve made an effort to organize and compile what has become an overwhelming volume of research into one comprehensive reference. My goal in publishing this new “full” timeline is to create a living public document that will serve this function more broadly, and can be added to over time.
For reference, my previous reports regarding Giuliani’s illegal activities in Ukraine and elsewhere around the globe can be read here
Rudy Giuliani met with Ukrainian President Poroshenko twice last year amid U.S.-Ukraine arms deal negotiations — July 26, 2018
L’Affaire Hampshire: Did Rudy Giuliani use a cheating scandal as cover for an illicit medical data operation? — September 4, 2018
This is why Rudy Giuliani is in Armenia right now. — October 24, 2018
DIRTY LAUNDRY: Giuliani’s finances while serving as Trump’s Cybersecurity Advisor are hung out to dry in divorce proceedings — November 15, 2018
Rudy, Ukraine, and the plot to fire Comey — January 14, 2019
What follows is the “Giuiani-Ukraine Back-channel” covering the time frame from January 2017 to June 2018, detailed with links to references as appropriate. As I continue collating this research through present day (September 2019), I will re-publish this post with updates.
JANUARY 2017 — MAY 2017
Early January: Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko hires U.S. lobbying firm BGR Group in an effort to gain access to newly-elected U.S. President Trump
January 12: After withdrawing himself from Secretary of State consideration, President-elect Trump names Rudy Giuliani his “informal” Cybersecurity Advisor
January 20: President Trump is inaugurated in Washington D.C.
Late January: Russian and Ukrainian oligarchs and officials attend inaugural events in D.C., meeting with dozens of GOP officials and lobbyists
Late January: Ukrainian Member of Parliament Andrei Artemenko meets with Felix Sater and Michael Cohen in New York City
Late January: MP Artemenko hands off Peace Plan documents to Sater and Cohen
January/February: Paul Manafort meets with Konstantin Kilimnik in Madrid
~February 6: Sater and Cohen deliver Peace Plan to National Security Advisor Michael Flynn
February 8: Yuri Vanetik and Manafort meet in NYC
February13: Flynn is fired for lying about his phone call with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak
February 19: New York Times breaks “scoop” revealing the Peace Plan back-channel with Artemenko --> Sater/Cohen --> Flynn
February 20: Russia’s Ambassador to United Nations Vitaly Churkin becomes ill in New York City and dies
February: TriGlobal Strategic Ventures (TGSV) begins negotiating Giuliani Safety and Security LLC (GSS) contract with City of Kharkiv Mayor Gennadiy Kernes — funded by Ukrainian oligarch Pavel Fuks
May 1: GSS team travels to Kharkiv for kick-off of their “security consulting” contract with Mayor Kernes
May 3: FBI Director James Comey testifies before congress, revealing FBI probe into Trump Campaign and Giuliani’s N.Y. FBI leaks
May 9: Trump fires Comey
May 9: GSS announces the Kharkiv contract and its kick-off on GSS website
May 9: Giuliani, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Ambassador Kislyak, and Ukrainian Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin arrive in D.C.
May 10: Giuliani visits White House and meets with Homeland Security Advisor Tom Bossert about cybersecurity
May 10: Trump meets with Lavrov and Kislyak, offering them classified intelligence
May 10: Vice President Mike Pence meets seperately with Klimkin and grants a photo op with Trump
May 11: Bossert announces admin’s first Executive Order on cybersecurity
May 11: Trump tweets “Let’s Make Peace!”
May 12: Artemenko alleges $400K bribe for access to Trump
May: FBI opens counter-intel and Special Counsel appointed
JUNE 2017 — AUGUST 2017
Early June: Giuliani travels to Kiev
Early June: Giuliani gives talk with Ukrainian oligarch Viktor Pinchuk
Early June: Giuliani meets with President Poroshenko, Prosecutor Yuriy Lutsenko, Prime Minister Vladimir Groisman, and Foreign Minister Pavlo Klimkin
Early June: Giuliani lands “consulting contract” with Kiev Mayor Victor Klitschko
June 20: Poroshenko meets with Trump in D.C., allegedly offering U.S. firms 90% of Donbas reconstruction projects
Late June: Poroshenko moves Manafort investigations from the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor to Prosecutor General Lutsenko ‘ to “languish”
July 7: Trump meets with Russian President Vladimir Putin for the first time at the G20 summit in Hamburg
July 9: Trump announces on Twitter that he and Vladimir Putin discussed a plan to form a “Joint Cybersecurity Unit”
July 10: The American public pans Trump’s partnership with Russia and the idea is reportedly “shelved”
July 18: Guliani’s GSS team travels back to Kharkiv for second meeting
July 19: U.S. State Deparment Secretary Rex Tillerson shutters the Office of Cyber Issues
July 20: Russia’s cyber envoy Andrey Krutskikh tells press that the “bilateral working group” is still underway
July 31: Poroshenko agrees to an energy deal with U.S. Secretary of Energy Rick Perry to buy U.S. coal at a marked-up/inflated price
August 4: Pentagon asks White House to approve lethal weapons to Ukraine, proposing a $50 million Javelin missile package
August 14: Mainstream media outlets push a disinformation campaign using a flawed think tank study — the findings allege Ukraine had sold missiles to North Korea on black market
August: Trump “stalls” approval of Pentagon’s proposed lethal arms package for Ukraine
OCTOBER 2017 — DECEMBER 2017
October 27: Paul Manafort and Rick Gates indicted for financial crimes relating to their work in Ukraine, including conspiracy against U.S.
October 27: George Papadopolous plea agreement released by Special Counsel
November 11: Trump and Putin meet three times on sidelines of Asia-Pacific Summit in Vietnam
November 14: Trump tells press he believes Putin did not intefere in election
November 17: Trump green lights presentation of $47M lethal arms package to Ukraine
November 20: Giuliani travels to Kharkiv on private jet of Ukrainian oligarch Alexander Rovt
November 21:: Giuliani promises Kharkiv Mayor Kernes a special “support office” in U.S.
November 22: Giuliani travels to Kiev, meets with Mayor Klitscheko
November 22: Giuliani meets with Poroshenko to discuss Russian aggression, corruption reform, and US-Ukraine cooperation on cybersecurity
November: Poroshenko allegedly gives order to stop cooperation with U.S. investigators
December: Ukrainian officials allegedly cancel trips to meet with CIA Director Mike Pompeo and Special Counsel Mueller
December 15: Trump calls Putin to say “thank you” for comments Putin made regarding the U.S. economy
December 17: Putin calls Trump to say “thank you” for an intelligence tip regarding a St. Petersburg terrorist plot
December 20: Trump approves grant package of $41 million in sniper equipment, but does not move on Javelins
MARCH 2018 — JUNE 2018
March: After a two month delay, Pentagon signs off on shipment of Javelin missiles to Ukraine
March: Cambridge Analytica whistle blower Christopher Wylie comes forward
Late March: Kharkiv delegation headed by Deputy Mayor Igor Terehov travels to New York City
Late March: Giuliani lands Kharkiv delegation special access to “study” New York and New Jersey Department of Emergency Management
March 28: Giuliani travels to Cottage Hospital in rural New Hampshire
March 28: Giuliani helps Dr. Maria Ryan transfer 20 million medical records to AthenaHealth Cloud
Early April: Poroshenko officially “halts” Manafort investigation, blocking further subpoenas or witness interviews
Early April: Poroshenko confirms receipt of Javelin missiles
April 9: Michael Cohen raided by FBI
April 20: Giuliani is re-introduced to the public as Trump’s “lawyer”
Late April: Giuliani’s gas-lighting of America begins as he defends the president on air about hush money payments
April: Judith Giuliani files for divorce, alleging an affair with Dr. Ryan
Early June: Giuliani and Ryan travel to Israel
June 7: Giuliani and Ryan tour Hadassah Medical Center in Jerusalem
Mid June: Giuliani and Ryan travel to Scotland to golf at Trump International Links
Late June: Giuliani and Ryan travel to Paris for MEK conference
Late June: Giuliani and Ryan travel to Normandy
June 27: Supreme Court Justice Kennedy announces retirement
https://medium.com/@PortlusGlam/rogue-a ... d87fa3a886
by seemslikeadream » Fri Sep 27, 2019 9:08 am
Zev Shalev
From tapes to treason and cover-ups to conspiracy, today had it all. I love @DrDenaGrayson and she made some great points about the #WhistleblowerComplaint. A day that will go down in history . Watch and RT! #Whistleblower @NarativLive
https://twitter.com/LincolnsBible?ref_s ... r%5Eauthor
Tom Gara
I salute Politico for running one of 2019's greatest headlines - it has since been changed, tragically, but it lives on as a URL https://www.politico.com/magazine/story ... lle-228580 …
https://twitter.com/jbinckes/status/1177594088352292865
Trump, Giuliani, and Manafort: The Ukraine Scheme
Murray Waas
September 25, 2019, 3:40 pm
https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2019/09/2 ... ne-scheme/
by Belligerent Savant » Fri Sep 27, 2019 1:23 pm
by seemslikeadream » Fri Sep 27, 2019 1:50 pm
Eric Umansky
The intel inspector general, *appointed by Trump,* concluded that the prez “may have illegally solicited a foreign campaign contribution and his potential misconduct created a national security risk.”
In past 2 hours, we’ve learned:
Trump’s intel IG thinks Trump may have broken the law
Ukraine thought investigating Biden was prerequisite to talk to Trump
The WH didn’t log call the normal way, per whistleblower
Trump first raised this in *April*
Oh wait, there's *another* revelation:
-The intel IG notified the DOJ that the president had possibly violated the law.
The DOJ decided to close the investigation.
Who made that call? A Trump appointee.
A Defense Department letter appears to conflict with Trump's assessment that Ukraine wasn't doing enough to fight corruption
David Choi14 hours ago
A letter from a top Pentagon official appeared to undercut President Donald Trump's opinion that Ukraine was not doing enough to rectify what he perceived to be a rampant case of corruption in the country, according to documents obtained by NPR.
In the letter, the Defense Department said it worked with the State Department to determine that Ukraine had "taken substantial actions to make defense institutional reforms for the purposes of decreasing corruption, increasing accountability, and sustaining improvements of combat capability enabled by US assistance."
The contents of the letter conflicts with the Trump administration's assertion that Ukraine was not doing enough to combat allegations of corruption.
"If there's corruption and we're paying lots of money to a country, we don't want a country that we're giving massive aid to be corrupting our system," Trump said to reporters on Sunday.
Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
A letter from a top Pentagon official appeared to undercut President Donald Trump's assertion that Ukraine was not doing enough to rectify what he perceived to be a rampant case of corruption in the country, according to documents obtained by NPR.
The letter, which was written by Undersecretary of Defense for Policy John Rood, was sent in May to congressional leaders and committees. In it, the Defense Department said it worked with the State Department to determine that Ukraine had "taken substantial actions to make defense institutional reforms for the purposes of decreasing corruption, increasing accountability, and sustaining improvements of combat capability enabled by US assistance."
The federal analysis is required by law for the US to dispense military aid funds to Ukraine, in order to provide defensive capabilities to the country — including "training, equipment, and logistics support, supplies, to the military and other security forces."
The contents of the letter conflicts with the Trump administration's assertion that Ukraine was not doing enough to combat allegations of corruption. One senior US official told The Washington Post on Monday that the withholding of funds were due to Trump's belief that there was "a lot of corruption in Ukraine."
Read more: Ukraine's president tells Trump to his face that he doesn't want to be involved in US elections
"If there's corruption and we're paying lots of money to a country, we don't want a country that we're giving massive aid to to be corrupting our system," Trump said to reporters on Sunday.
According to The Post, Trump instructed acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney to withhold nearly $400 million in military aid to Ukraine shortly before his July 25 phone call with its newly elected president, Volodymyr Zelensky.
The funds were eventually released September 11, but the administration cited "concerns" and told congressional lawmakers that the delay was due to an "interagency process."
Democrats have scrutinized the delay in the dispersal of funds, which the Trump administration had already said it intended to approve in February and May.
Trump has come under increased pressure following the revelation of a whistleblower complaint lodged in August by a member of the intelligence community, which is linked to Ukraine.
It is unclear if Trump pressured President Zelensky to investigate unfounded allegations against a political opponent — former vice president and 2020 Democratic candidate Joe Biden and his son Hunter — as a condition for receiving the military aid funds.
Trump denied there was a "quid pro quo" arrangement during his discussions with President Zelensky, who met the US president at the United Nations building in New York on Wednesday.
https://www.businessinsider.com/pentago ... er=twitter
NRA Was 'Foreign Asset' To Russia Ahead of 2016, New Senate Report Reveals
Tim Mak
September 27, 201910:01 AM ET
National Rifle Association Chief Executive Wayne LaPierre speaks at the NRA Annual Meeting in Indianapolis in April.
Michael Conroy/AP
Updated at 11:06 a.m. ET
The National Rifle Association acted as a "foreign asset" for Russia in the period leading up to the 2016 election, according to a new investigation unveiled Friday by Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore.
Drawing on contemporaneous emails and private interviews, an 18-month probe by the Senate Finance Committee's Democratic staff found that the NRA underwrote political access for Russian nationals Maria Butina and Alexander Torshin more than previously known — even though the two had declared their ties to the Kremlin.
The report, available here, also describes how closely the gun rights group was involved with organizing a 2015 visit by some of its leaders to Moscow.
Then-NRA vice president Pete Brownell, who would later become NRA president, was enticed to visit Russia with the promise of personal business opportunities — and the NRA covered a portion of the trip's costs.
The conclusions of the Senate investigation could have legal implications for the NRA, Wyden says.
Tax-exempt organizations are barred from using funds for the personal benefit of its officials or for actions significantly outside their stated missions. The revelations in the Senate report raise questions about whether the NRA could face civil penalties or lose its tax-exempt status.
Attorneys general in the state of New York and the District of Columbia are also conducting separate probes into alleged wrongdoing at the gun rights organization. These probes have a broader scope than the Senate report, which focuses on Russia.
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Majority response: This is overblown
The Republican majority on the Senate Finance Committee, which was consulted periodically throughout the Democrats' investigation, said on Friday the report was overblown.
In the Republicans' analysis of Wyden's report, the majority argued that it does not account for U.S.-Russia relations at the time and contains "much conclusory innuendo... and repeatedly attempts to paint a picture that does not exist."
The Republicans also argued that if the NRA committed any infractions they would be small and do not put the NRA's tax-exempt status at risk.
"To the extent NRA funds were used improperly in any facts discussed in the [Democratic report led by Wyden], it appears to have been minor, hardly a rounding error for an organization with hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue each year and nothing that cannot be corrected with minor intermediate sanctions," the Republican analysis states.
Kremlin links were clear
Wyden's 77-page report centers on Butina — a convicted Russian agent now in federal prison — and Torshin, a former Russian government official who has been sanctioned by the United States.
The report indicates that top NRA officials were aware of Butina's and Torshin's links with the Kremlin even as they sought to work more closely together under the banner of gun rights.
In an email later circulated to two senior NRA staff members, Butina wrote that a purpose of the 2015 Moscow trip was that "many powerful figures in the Kremlin are counting on Torshin to prove his American connections" by showing he could bring prominent NRA officials to Russia.
At another point, Butina suggested to participants on the 2015 NRA trip to Russia that she might be able to set up a meeting between them and President Vladimir Putin, referring to him as "Russia's highest leader."
NRA facilitated political access
Despite these declarations about their ties to the Russian government, NRA officials paid for and facilitated Torshin and Butina's introduction into American political organizations.
Butina and Torshin received access to Republican Party officials at NRA events.
It was a explicit interest expressed by Butina: In one 2015 email to an NRA employee, Butina wrote, "is there a list of U.S. governors or members of Congress that might be present at some time during the [NRA] annual meeting?"
The employee responded with a list.
The NRA also helped them forge connections with other groups such as the Council for National Policy, the National Prayer Breakfast, the National Sporting Goods Wholesalers Association and Safari Club International.
"NRA resources appear to have been used to pay for membership and registration fees to third party events for [Torshin and Butina] as well as to arrange for transit to and lodging for many of those events throughout 2015 and 2016," the report states.
Report contradicts NRA denials
The Senate report notes that in 2018, then-NRA spokeswoman Dana Loesch repeatedly denied that the group leaders' 2015 trip to Moscow was sanctioned by the gun rights group.
But in a letter obtained by the committee, then-NRA President Alan Cors wrote to Torshin on NRA letterhead after consulting with NRA staff and former NRA President David Keene.
Cors designated two NRA figures to lead the trip: "Dave Keene and [top NRA donor] Joe Gregory will represent the NRA and our five million members better than anyone else," he wrote.
During the course of the investigation, Brownell's lawyer also told the committee that Brownell believed the trip to be an official NRA event.
This view is further strengthened by the committee's evidence that NRA staff prepared itineraries, gathered briefing materials, applied for tourist visas, paid for some of the travel expenses, and provided the delegation with NRA gifts to give to Russian officials.
The Senate investigation also found evidence that the NRA tried to hide various payments related to the trip.
Brownell covered approximately $21,000 in expenses related to the trip; in June 2016, the NRA reimbursed Brownell just over $21,000.
After questions were raised about the trip in 2018, Brownell paid the NRA $17,000 — a transaction that Brownell's lawyer told the committee was requested by the NRA as a way of "getting the trip off the NRA's books."
NRA leaders sought business opportunities
The Senate investigation concludes that a number of NRA figures on the 2015 trip traveled to Russia "primarily or solely for the purpose of advancing personal business interests, rather than advancing the NRA's tax-exempt purpose."
Brownell, then a vice president of the NRA, is the CEO of a major firearms supplier bearing his last name.
In an email to a staffer at his business, Brownell described his trip as "an opportunity to be hosted in Russia to broaden our business opportunities ... to introduce our company to the governing individuals throughout Russia."
"The NRA directly facilitated Brownell's effort to travel to Moscow early to explore business opportunities with Russian weapons manufacturers," the report concludes.
Another member of the trip, NRA donor and then-Outdoor Channel CEO Jim Liberatore, told the Senate committee through his lawyer that his participation in the 2015 Moscow trip was "purely commercial."
Wyden seeks IRS probe
Wyden, the top Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said at the conclusion of his investigation that his staff had revealed information that shows that the National Rifle Association may have abused its tax-exempt status.
The next step, he says, is for the IRS to launch its own inquiry.
"The totality of evidence uncovered during my investigation, as well as the mounting evidence of rampant self-dealing, indicate the NRA may have violated tax laws," Wyden said. "The IRS needs to examine these findings and investigate other publicly reported incidents of potential lawbreaking."
https://www.npr.org/2019/09/27/76487924 ... rt-reveals
Ron Wyden
NEWS: For more than a year my @SenateFinance staff has been investigating the NRA’s relationship with foreign agent Maria Butina and Russian government official Alexander Torshin and their role in the Kremlin’s efforts to interfere in the 2016 election.
Here’s what they found.
7:11 AM - 27 Sep 2019
The NRA lied about the December 2015 Moscow trip not being an official trip.
NRA leaders were told the trip was needed to prove Torshin’s American connections to the Kremlin, and that building relationships with Russians was “NRA business.”
While in Moscow, the NRA delegation met with a host of senior level Kremlin officials, including some of Putin’s closest advisors (at least two of whom had been sanctioned by the U.S. government), and multiple Russian oligarchs close to Putin.
The now-convicted Russian agent Maria Butina made clear to the NRA she wanted to bring the “head of the most powerful political organization in America” to Russia.
The incoming NRA president only agreed to participate in the trip after he was offered the opportunity to explore lucrative business deals with Russian weapons manufacturers, on the condition that he bring the NRA to Russia.
He was even offered a meeting with Vladimir Putin.
After returning from Moscow, the NRA gave the Russians free rein over the guest list for its 2016 Annual Meeting. It also provided access to other political organizations in 2015 and 2016 like the National Prayer Breakfast and the secretive right-wing Council for National Policy.
NRA officers’ apparent use of the NRA for personal gain fits a larger pattern of reported self-dealing and raises serious questions about whether the NRA broke U.S. tax laws.
Read more about our investigation and its extensive findings:
https://www.finance.senate.gov/download ... eign-asset
by seemslikeadream » Fri Sep 27, 2019 3:24 pm
In Bid For Biden Dirt, Giuliani Dove Deep Into Ukrainian Political Muck
BEDMINSTER TOWNSHIP, NJ - NOVEMBER 20: (L to R) Former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani stands with president-elect Donald Trump before their meeting at Trump International Golf Club, November 20, 2016 in Bedminster... MORE
By Josh Kovensky
September 27, 2019 11:08 am
Like a grotesque buddy comedy, the story of Rudy Giuliani and Donald Trump’s pressure campaign to extract beneficial political information from Ukraine is equal parts absurd and horrifying.
And the story only gets weirder following a look at the details of the whistleblower complaint released by the House Intelligence Committee on Thursday, which contains a narrative — and sophisticated analysis — of the Ukrainian political snakepit in which the pair enmeshed themselves.
The complaint presents a complex view of various Ukrainians involved in the pressure campaign, each with their own axe to grind. It alleges efforts by Ukrainian actors — many of whom corresponded with Giuliani — to advance their own interests through the U.S. political system by aiding the former New York City mayor’s quest for political dirt.
The nuanced view of Ukrainian politics makes sense given a Thursday New York Times report which suggests that the whistleblower is a CIA officer well-versed in Eastern European politics with access to detailed information about that part of the world.
The whistleblower’s story of a symbiotic relationship between Ukrainian politicos and Giuliani is similar to one advanced in May 2019 by the Trump administration’s special envoy for Ukraine, Kurt Volker. At that time, it was clear from press reports and Giuliani’s own statements that he was attempting to dig up dirt on Biden in Ukraine.
“Other people in Ukraine are trying to use the U.S. domestic politics as a vehicle for their own engagement either in fighting their domestic enemies inside Ukraine or trying to feel like they’ve got some special relationship with people in the United States,” Volker said.
(Perhaps ironically, later that summer, Volker would end up arranging a meeting between Giuliani and a senior Ukrainian official in furtherance of the effort.)
Volker’s May 2019 remarks came as Giuliani was escalating what the complaint portrays as a campaign to pressure the Ukrainian government into manufacturing information against Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and regarding the supposed origins of the Trump-Russia probe.
But the story begins months earlier, with a bevy of articles published in The Hill’s opinion section by conservative journalist (and noted reporter of Republican opposition research) John Solomon. These columns first elevated the Biden allegations, among other narratives about Ukraine that have taken hold on the U.S. political right.
Solomon’s main source for these articles appeared to be a Ukrainian politician named Yury Lutsenko — the country’s then-prosecutor general.
Lutsenko came to the job after Viktor Shokin, the prosecutor who Trump has falsely accused Biden of firing to protect his son.
Lutsenko appears to have also been a main source for Giuliani. The two met in January 2019. Lutsenko, as Ukraine’s general prosecutor, lent a veneer of legitimacy to Giuliani’s claims against Biden.
Solomon published his first interviews with Lutsenko in late March 2019, as the Mueller investigation drew to a close.
In one story, Lutsenko claimed that he had “opened a probe into alleged attempts by Ukrainians to interfere in the 2016 U.S. Presidential election.” The then-chief prosecutor played into allegations that Kyiv had interfered in 2016 to help Democrats, in part by releasing damaging information about Paul Manafort.
In another, he accused then-U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch of giving him a “do-not-prosecute” list.
Other Ukrainian officials — including another prosecutor named Nazar Kholodnytsky — appeared in Solomon’s articles, making allegations against Biden while also claiming that the Ukrainian government fabricated — and leaked — financial records that forced the August 2016 resignation of Paul Manafort as chairman of the Trump campaign.
The information Lutsenko and Kholodnytsky gave to Solomon can be viewed as helping to advance their own political standing. At the time of the interviews with Solomon, Lutsenko’s political position had deteriorated. He was closely linked to the outgoing regime and was fighting to hold onto his position as the new government — led by Zelensky — prepared to take power.
Yovanovitch’s firing, for example, came after she criticized Lutsenko and demanded Kholodnytsky’s removal. Weeks after Yovanovitch did that, Solomon published articles citing both, accusing her of giving the prosecutors a “do-not-prosecute” list.
The whistleblower complaint suggests that Yovanovitch was fired “because of pressure stemming” from Lutsenko’s allegations.
It’s not clear how Solomon got in touch with the Ukrainians in the first place. In one of Solomon’s articles, Lutsenko said that he wanted to inform Attorney General Bill Barr about the allegations.
Regardless, both Trump and Giuliani promoted the allegations in the articles.
In an April 25 Sean Hannity appearance, Trump commented on Solomon’s reporting. “It sounds very interesting with respect to the Ukraine,” he said, adding that he had just spoken with Zelensky, a congratulatory phone call following Zelensky’s electoral win that would be their only conversation until July.
Hannity replied that Ukraine was “offering this evidence” to the U.S. about “collusion” in favor of “Hillary Clinton’s campaign in 2016.”
“Does America need to see that information in spite of all of the attacks against you on collusion?” he asked.
Trump replied, “frankly, we have a great new attorney general who has done an unbelievable job in a very short period of time.”
“He is very smart and tough and I would certainly defer to him,” Trump added. “I would imagine he would want to see this.”
Through a DOJ spokeswoman, Barr has denied that he knew of requests to work with Ukraine to investigate Biden.
Giuliani also promoted the allegations, and reportedly remained in contact with Lutsenko through May.
If you doubt there is media bias and corruption then when Democrats conspiring with Ukrainian officials comes out remember much of press, except for Fox, the Hill and NYT, has suppressed it. If it involved @realDonaldTrump or his son it would have been front page news for weeks.
— Rudy Giuliani (@RudyGiuliani) May 10, 2019
Later in May, a former staffer at Ukraine’s embassy in Washington named Andriy Telizhenko also met with Giuliani.
Armed with his own ambitions at building a political consulting career and desire to exhibit connections and influence in U.S.-Ukraine relations, Telizhenko has long propagated a narrative in which the DNC attempted to “collude” with Ukraine’s D.C. embassy against the 2016 Trump campaign.
That appears to have been enough for Giuliani, who met with both Telizhenko and Kholodnytsky in May.
Lutsenko left his position as general prosecutor in August; he was replaced by a Zelensky ally. Neither Telizhenko nor Kholodnytsky have positions in Zelensky’s government.
Zelensky, meanwhile, is left to handle the aftermath of their dealings with Giuliani.
White House confirms an ‘explosive’ detail in the whistleblower’s damning complaint
Cody Fenwick53 mins ago
CNN
Defenders of President Donald Trump pushing back against the drive for impeachment have clung to a desperate talking point as they try to deflect from the growing Ukraine scandal: the whistleblower complaint that has drawn so much attention to the issue, they say, is based on second-hand information and is not credible.
The problem with that line is that the whistleblower complaint keeps getting confirmed — by the White House itself. On Friday, it admitted to another damning detail in the complaint — that White House staff used a highly secure storage system to conceal the records of Trump’s call with the Ukrainian president, since released under public pressure, which clearly showed up him pressuring the foreign leader to investigate Joe Biden, a potential 2020 election opponent.
“The White House is acknowledging for the first time that that transcript of the president’s call with the president of Ukraine was moved from where these transcripts are typically stored to a different server, a server that’s typically for information that’s national-security sensitive, for very sensitive information, not typically for the readouts of the president’s calls with heads of state,” said Kaitlan Collins of CNN, which first broke the story. “This is one of the more explosive claims in that whistleblower’s complaint.”
It’s explosive for at least two reasons. First, it shows that the White House, and possibly the president himself, knew immediately that the call was improper — demonstrating “consciousness of guilt,” if you will. Second, it could constitute another abuse entirely — misusing the administration’s record-keeping apparatus to conceal embarrassing and damning information about the president.
Further, it bolsters the allegation’s general credibility, which has already been substantially confirmed. The complaint accurately detailed both the July 25 call with Ukraine before it has been made public, and it also revealed that the White House had been withholding aid to the country in an apparent effort to further place pressure on its president before this was publicly known, which the president has since admitted.
CNN reported:
In a statement provided to CNN, a senior White House official said the move to place the transcript in the system came at the direction of National Security Council attorneys.
“NSC lawyers directed that the classified document be handled appropriately,” the senior White House official said.
White House officials say the transcript was already classified so it did nothing wrong by moving it to another system.
But Washington Post national security reporter Shane Harris argued that this claim from the White House was highly misleading.
“That system is NOT intended for calls like this,” he said in a tweet. “That system contains information that is so highly-classified and restricted that even having the highest-level clearances doesn’t automatically get you access. This is a compartmented system, and access is particularized and restricted.”
He added: “Information about covert operations, for instance, can be stored on this system. Experts I’ve spoken to see no credible national security purpose that required or justified the Trump/Zelensky transcript, at least as we’ve seen it, being placed there.”
https://www.alternet.org/2019/09/white- ... ssion=true
‘What did Mike Pence know? What did Mike Pence do? John Bolton knows’: MSNBC’s Morning Joe
6 hours ago
MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough fingered Vice President Mike Pence’s role in the growing Ukraine scandal — and identified one former official who could bring him down.
The “Morning Joe” host said the vice president appears to be involved in President Donald Trump’s scheme to withhold congressionally approved military aid to Ukraine as leverage to get the foreign government to dig up dirt against Joe Biden.
“This is what Donald Trump usually does, he has other people deliver their threats for them,” Scarborough said. “We don’t know if there was a quid pro quo saying, if you — again, because — I’ve got to see what’s so shocking about this is the question was asked almost a month ago, the question was asked a month ago by an Associated Press reporter, ‘Are you holding up military aid until they investigate Biden?'”
Scarborough said he and Brzezinski heard almost two months ago from a former Department of Defense official that Trump was holding up the aid as leverage, and he said the allegation was widely known.
“It seemed to be the worst kept secret in Washington, D.C., that’s why Republicans denying a quid pro quo today is so laughable,” Scarborough said.
Pence met with Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky early this month in Poland, where he denied speaking about Biden but did admit to discussing corruption — which Trump has used as a code word for his efforts to investigate the former vice president’s son.
“But the question is, what did Mike Pence know?” Scarborough said. “What did Mike Pence do? What did Mike Pence say in that closed-door meeting in early September?”
Scarborough said the vice president was accompanied in that meeting by the national security adviser — who recently left the administration in a bitter dispute with the president.
“Guess who knows the answer to that?” he said. “John Bolton. Interesting times ahead.”
by RocketMan » Fri Sep 27, 2019 3:32 pm
Remember the standard that Democrats as a party already set. Bush literally lied us into a war where thousands of our men and women and thousands of innocent Iraqis were killed. His administration committed acts of torture under our name, but Bush's administration was never even fully investigated for these acts, let alone impeached. Is this call with Ukraine really worse than that?
For all their appeals to enduring moral values, whether US exceptionalism or legal principle, the centrists are deploying a transparent strategy to return to power. Trump’s shambolic presidency somehow seems less unsavoury than the fact that neither of these sides are able to admit how massively his election signified the failure of their policies, from endless war to economic inequality.
by seemslikeadream » Fri Sep 27, 2019 3:39 pm
Scott Stedman
@ScottMStedman
Holy shit. It looks like Joe diGenova and Victoria Toensing got the corrupt ex-Prosecutor in Ukraine to make ridiculous claims in a sworn affidavit for their new Ukrainian client.
Shokin Statement
Sworn statement of former Ukraine Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin
https://www.scribd.com/document/4276183 ... -Statement
8:55 PM · Sep 26, 2019
The ex-Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin made the statement in a case against Dmitry Firtash, the new client of diGenova and Toensing on September 4th. This is before the whistleblower story broke.
This new bit of info seems to suggest that diGenova and Toensing were aware of the plot to go after Biden. Not only that, but they got the Prosecutor to submit a sworn affidavit in a case regarding their brand new client in advance of that goal.
This STINKS. Russian mob-connected Firtash hired diGenova and Toensing in August and less than a month later, the Ukrainian Prosecutor is testifying in Firtash's case making outlanding claims about Biden.
by seemslikeadream » Fri Sep 27, 2019 5:25 pm
Deutsche Bank Says It Has Tax Filings of 2 Trump Family Members, but Won't Say Who
The filings of at least one of those individuals, the bank said, are protected by confidentiality provisions in a contract they entered into with Deutsche Bank. The second individual, however, did not have such a provision that would theoretically shield their identity.
By Dan M. Clark September 27, 2019 at 03:55 PM
Deutsche Bank (Photo: Michael A. Scarcella/ ALM)Deutsche Bank storefront. Photo: Michael A. Scarcella/ ALM
Deutsche Bank revealed for the first time Friday that it has in its possession the tax filings of two individuals, not entities, within the family of President Donald Trump, but said contractual obligations still bar the company from revealing at least one of those names.
The filing was in response to a motion from a coalition of major media outlets, which asked a federal appellate court to force Deutsche Bank to reveal their identities this month.
“Based on Deutsche Bank’s current knowledge and the results of the extensive searches that have already been conducted, the bank has in its possession tax returns (in either draft or as-filed form) responsive to the subpoenas for two individuals, not entities, named in the subpoenas,” attorneys for Deutsche Bank wrote.
The subpoenas referenced in the filing were sent to Deutsche Bank from Democrats in Congress earlier this year, who were seeking documents related to the finances of Trump and his three eldest children: Donald Trump Jr., Eric Trump and Ivanka Trump.
An attorney for the U.S. House of Representatives has said those subpoenas were part of a broader effort to investigate money laundering and foreign influence on the U.S. government.
Attorneys for Trump sued Deutsche Bank earlier this year to block the company from disclosing his financial information to Congress, including his tax filings. A federal judge declined to grant a motion by Trump’s attorneys for a preliminary injunction, which is now before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.
Deutsche Bank, represented by Raphael Prober from Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld in Washington, D.C., was ordered by the federal appellate court in August to disclose whether it had the tax filings of any Trump family member or entity targeted by the subpoenas.
In a letter to the Second Circuit, Deutsche Bank confirmed last month that it had tax filings related to the Trump family but declined to say publicly if they belonged to an individual or entity. The company also chose to redact the number of tax filings it had.
That changed Friday when Deutsche Bank said it had the tax returns of two individuals targeted by the subpoenas from Congress. But the company did not say who they belonged to.
The filings of at least one of those individuals, the bank said, are protected by confidentiality provisions in a contract they entered into with Deutsche Bank. The second individual, however, did not have such a provision that would theoretically shield their identity.
“With respect to the second individual, and based on diligent searches the bank has undertaken to date, the bank has identified contracts related to that individual; however, none of those contracts contain a similar confidentiality provision nor has the bank been able to locate a separate confidentiality contract pertaining to this second individual,” Deutsche Bank wrote.
Attorneys for Deutsche Bank also wrote in the letter that they haven’t been in contact with the Trump family members whose tax returns they have. They asked that, if the Second Circuit decides to force the company to release their names, that they be given advanced notice to make them aware.
Attorneys for Trump, in a separate filing Friday, argued that the Second Circuit should not force Deutsche Bank to reveal whose tax returns it has because the appellate court has never asked for those identities.
It only asked whether the bank had anyone’s filings, they argued, so the identities of those individuals is irrelevant.
“Plaintiffs’ interests are more than sufficient to justify the limited redaction of customer information—information that the Court never asked Deutsche Bank to disclose and that has no bearing on the legal decision the Court will make,” Trump’s attorneys wrote.
The court was, instead, asked whether Deutsche Bank had anyone’s tax returns to consider the relevance of a taxpayer-privacy statute, Trump’s attorneys wrote. The names attached to those filings wouldn’t matter to the court in that instance, they argued.
“It has no bearing on the legal issue that prompted the inquiry. It should not be part of the record in this case,” Trump’s attorneys wrote.
He was represented on the filing by Patrick Strawbridge, an attorney with Consovoy McCarthy who’s representing Trump in multiple tax-related challenges.
The coalition of media outlets, which include major players in the industry like CNN and The Associated Press, filed a motion to intervene in the proceeding earlier this month in which they argued that the public, and subsequently the press, have a constitutional right to know whose tax returns Deutsche Bank has.
They argued that an unredacted version of the filing should be made available because Deutsche Bank had not met its burden of showing why the information should be kept private, and because the filing is of significant interest to the public.
“As Deutsche Bank has not identified a substantial risk to a compelling government interest, it cannot meet its burden to overcome the public’s right of access, and the redacted names should be unsealed forthwith,” they wrote.
Part of their argument also centered on the decision-making process of the Second Circuit.
An unredacted version of Deutsche Bank’s filing from last month has already been filed under seal with the Second Circuit. The media groups argued that, since the unredacted version of the document will presumably be used by the court in its decision, it should be made public.
Trump’s attorneys disputed that the actual identities on the document would be considered by the court in its final ruling, and said the interest of keeping those names from the public outweighed a presumption of access.
“There are compelling reasons to keep the information here under seal,” Trump’s attorneys wrote. “The redactions involve specific and sensitive financial details that are protected by multiple statutes, and that were provided to Deutsche Bank with the expectation of confidentiality.”
The motion was brought by the Associated Press, CNN, the New York Times, Politico, the Washington Post, Reuters and Dow Jones & Co., according to the filing.
They’re represented by Jacquelyn Schell, an associate with Ballard Spahr in Manhattan. Schell was not immediately available for comment on the filing Friday.
https://www.law.com/newyorklawjournal/2 ... 0827172122
White House restricted access to Trump's calls with Putin and Saudi crown prince
Washington(CNN) — White House efforts to limit access to President Donald Trump's conversations with foreign leaders extended to phone calls with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and Russian leader Vladimir Putin, according to people familiar with the matter.
Those calls -- both with leaders who maintain controversial relationships with Trump -- were among the presidential conversations that aides took remarkable steps to keep from becoming public.
In the case of Trump's call with Prince Mohammed, officials who ordinarily would have been given access to a rough transcript of the conversation never saw one, according to one of the sources. Instead, a transcript was never circulated at all, which the source said was highly unusual, particularly after a high-profile conversation.
The call - which the person said contained no especially sensitive national security secrets -- came as the White House was confronting the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, which US intelligence assessments said came at the hand of the Saudi government.
With Putin, access to the transcript of at least one of Trump's conversations was also tightly restricted, according to a former Trump administration official.
It's not clear if aides took the additional step of placing the Saudi Arabia and Russia phone calls in the same highly secured electronic system that held a now-infamous phone call with Ukraine's president and which helped spark a whistleblower complaint made public this week, though officials confirmed calls aside from the Ukraine conversation were placed there.
But the attempts to conceal information about Trump's discussions with Prince Mohammed and Putin further illustrate the extraordinary efforts taken by Trump's aides to strictly limit the number of people with access to his conversations with foreign leaders.
The White House did not comment about the limiting of access to calls with the Russian and Saudi leaders.
Officials said the practice began more than a year ago after embarrassing leaks revealed information about Trump's phone conversations with the leaders of Australia and Mexico. While it includes the highly secure system for particularly sensitive matters, it has also extended to limiting the number of individuals who are provided a transcript or are able to listen to the call.
Those efforts have come under scrutiny after the intelligence whistleblower alleged that White House officials took unusual steps to conceal Trump's phone call with Ukraine's new president.
The complaint alleged the handling of the Ukraine call was "not the first time" that such steps had been taken "solely for the purpose of protecting political sensitive — rather than national security sensitive — information."
Administration officials say John Eisenberg, the White House deputy counsel for national security affairs and a national security legal adviser, directed the Ukraine transcript call be moved to the separate highly classified system, as detailed in the whistleblower complaint.
That system is normally reserved for "code word" documents that are extremely sensitive, such as covert operations.
Eisenberg also played a role in the early Justice Department handling of the whistleblower complaint. Eisenberg was on an August 14 call with the general counsel of the intelligence agency where the complainant worked, and John Demers, the assistant attorney general for the Justice national security division, a US official briefed on the matter said.
During that call, the general counsel informed Eisenberg and Demers that there were concerns being raised about one of Trump's phone calls with a foreign leader. Eisenberg invited Demers and the intelligence agency's general counsel to review the transcript of the call, and Demers traveled to the White House the following day to review it. The general counsel of the intelligence agency declined to review the call, according to the official.
The White House acknowledged earlier Friday that administration officials directed the Ukraine call transcript be filed in a highly classified system, confirming allegations contained in the whistleblower complaint.
In a statement provided to CNN, a senior White House official said the move to place the transcript in the system came at the direction of National Security Council attorneys.
"NSC lawyers directed that the classified document be handled appropriately," the senior White House official said.
But the statement did not explain whether anyone else in the White House was part of the decision to put the Ukraine transcript in the more restrictive system. Nor did it delve into an accusation in the complaint that other phone call transcripts were handled in a similar fashion.
Like the call with Saudi's crown prince, the Ukraine transcript did not contain highly classified information to require such a move, raising questions about why the order was made.
The White House has not explained why it selectively put certain head of state calls into the codeword system, even when the content wasn't highly classified, such as the Ukraine call.
Officials from the past two administrations said it was unusual to transfer a transcript that doesn't contain sensitive information into the code word computer system.
"In my experience you would never move a transcript to the code word system if it does not have any code word terms. If the president is classifying and declassifying stuff he doesn't want to get out, that is an abuse of power and abuse of the system," said Sam Vinograd, a CNN national security analyst who served on President Barack Obama's National Security Council and at the Treasury Department under President George W. Bush.
Three other former National Security Council officials said they were unaware of calls that did not contain highly sensitive national security materials being moved into another location.
While the practice of limiting access to foreign leader calls began in earnest last year after the leaks of Mexico and Australian calls, it's not clear precisely when the initial steps were taken begin that effort.
The White House was also embarrassed when it was reported Trump had congratulated Putin on a phone call shortly after a Russian election widely seen as illegitimate. White House staff had written a memo specifically recommending Trump "do not congratulate" Putin in the call.
John Bolton, Trump's former national security adviser who departed from his post earlier this month, was known for keeping a tight hold on all information generally speaking, according to sources who worked with him at the NSC. He did not reply when asked for a request for comment through his spokesperson.
A former administration official said that despite the code word protection, you didn't necessarily need a special clearance to view the records and there was a process for officials to access the calls they wanted.
Trump's relationships with both Prince Mohammed and Putin have come under scrutiny over the past several years. Both are strongmen with dismal human rights records.
After Khashoggi was murdered at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October 2018, Trump vowed to get to the bottom of the matter. But he has repeatedly said he's unwilling to break off US-Saudi ties -- including military and trade — as a result.
With Putin, Trump has regularly worked arduously to guard his conversations, including asking for notes taken by his interpreter after their first encounter in 2017. He remains sensitive to accusations he's too cozy with the Russian leader who oversaw an election interference effort to get him elected.
https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2019/09/27/poli ... ssion=true
by seemslikeadream » Sat Sep 28, 2019 10:19 am
“President Trump told two senior Russian officials in a 2017 Oval Office meeting that he was unconcerned about Moscow’s interference in the U.S. election...”
It appears the Mueller team collected the notes of the Oval Office meeting with Lavrov and Kislyak that @shaneharris and his team reported new details about tonight; see the first reference in fn 468. Hopefully that means it’s not just locked on a WH server.
https://twitter.com/nycsouthpaw/status/ ... 0454248448
Trump told Russian officials in 2017 he wasn’t concerned about Moscow’s interference in U.S. election
Ellen Nakashima
President Trump meets with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, left, next to Russian Ambassador to the U.S. Sergey Kislyak at the White House on May 10, 2017. (Russian Foreign Ministry Photo/AP)
September 27 at 8:26 PM
President Trump told two senior Russian officials in a 2017 Oval Office meeting that he was unconcerned about Moscow’s interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election because the United States did the same in other countries, an assertion that prompted alarmed White House officials to limit access to the remarks to an unusually small number of people, according to three former officials with knowledge of the matter.
The comments, which have not been previously reported, were part of a now-infamous meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, in which Trump revealed highly classified information that exposed a source of intelligence on the Islamic State. He also said during the meeting that firing FBI Director James B. Comey the previous day had relieved “great pressure” on him.
A memorandum summarizing the meeting was limited to a few officials with the highest security clearances in an attempt to keep the president’s comments from being disclosed publicly, according to the former officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.
The White House’s classification of records about Trump’s communications with foreign officials is now a central part of the impeachment inquiry launched this week by House Democrats. An intelligence community whistleblower has alleged that the White House placed a record of Trump’s July 25 phone call with Ukraine’s president, in which he offered U.S. assistance investigating his political opponents, into a code-word classified system reserved for the most sensitive intelligence information.
The White House did not provide a comment Friday.
It is not clear whether a memo documenting the May 10, 2017, meeting with Lavrov and Kislyak was placed into that system, but the three former officials said it was restricted to a very small number of people. The White House had recently begun limiting the records of Trump’s calls after remarks he made to the leaders of Mexico and Australia appeared in news reports. The Lavrov memo was restricted to an even smaller group, the former officials said.
A fourth former official, who did not recall the president’s remarks to the Russian officials, said memos were restricted only to people who needed to know their contents.
“It was more about learning how can we restrict this in a way that still informs the policy process and the principals who need to engage with these heads of state,” the fourth former official said.
But the three former officials with knowledge of the remarks said some memos of the president’s communications were kept from people who might ordinarily have access to them. The Lavrov memo fit that description, they said.
White House officials were particularly distressed by Trump’s election remarks because it appeared the president was forgiving Russia for an attack that had been designed to help elect him, the three former officials said. Trump also seemed to invite Russia to interfere in other countries’ elections, they said.
The previous day, Trump had fired Comey amid the FBI’s investigation into whether the Trump campaign had coordinated with Russia. White House aides worried about the political ramifications if Trump’s comments to the Russian officials became public.
Trump had publicly ridiculed the Russia investigation as politically motivated and said he doubted Moscow had intervened in the election. By the time he met with Lavrov and Kislyak, Trump had been briefed by the most senior U.S. intelligence officials about the Russian operation, which was directed by Russian President Vladimir Putin and included the theft and publication of Democratic emails and the seeding of propaganda in social media, according to the findings of the U.S. intelligence community.
Trump’s firing of Comey touched off an investigation into whether the president had tried to obstruct the FBI’s probe. His comments about Comey’s dismissal being a relief, which were first reported the same month by the New York Times, reinforced suspicions that Trump dismissed Comey because the FBI was investigating him.
According to the fourth former official, Trump lamented to Lavrov that “all this Russia stuff” was detrimental to good relations. Trump also complained, “I could have a great relationship with you guys, but you know, our press,” this former official said, characterizing the president’s remarks.
H.R. McMaster, the president’s then-national security adviser, repeatedly told Trump he could not trust the Russians, according to two former officials.
On some areas, Trump conveyed U.S. policy in a constructive way, such as telling the Russians that their aggression in Ukraine was not good, one of those former officials said.
“What was difficult to understand was how they got a free pass on a lot of things — election security and so forth,” this former official said. “He was just very accommodating to them.”
The former official observed that Trump has “that streak of moral equivalency,” recalling how he once dismissed a question about the assassination of journalists and dissidents in Putin’s Russia by telling Fox News’s Bill O’Reilly: “There are a lot of killers. You think our country’s so innocent?”
Another former official said Trump wasn’t the only one to conflate Russia’s interference in the U.S. elections with U.S. efforts to promote democracy and good governance abroad.
The president and his top aides seemed not to understand the difference between Voice of America, a U.S.-supported news organization that airs in foreign countries, with Russian efforts to persuade American voters by surreptitiously planting ads in social media, this person said.
One former senior official said Trump regularly defended Russia’s actions, even in private, saying no country is pure. “He was always defensive of Russia,” this person said, adding the president had never made such a specific remark about interference in their presence.
“He thought the whole interference thing was ridiculous. He never bought into it.”
Greg Miller contributed to this report.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national ... story.html
NRA Uses Looming Impeachment Threat To Squeeze Trump On Gun Control
Matt Shuham
on May 20, 2016 in Louisville, Kentucky.
LOUISVILLE, KY - MAY 20: Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is introduced with Wayne LaPierre, Executive Vice President of the National Rifle Association, at the National Rifle Association's NRA-ILA (Inst... MORE
The squeeze is on.
With President Donald Trump facing impeachment, the NRA is reportedly looking to leverage the political moment to lock in his opposition to new gun control measures.
Trump and NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre met Friday to discuss the the NRA providing financial support for Trump’s impeachment defense, the New York Times reported Friday.
The support comes at a price.
“Mr. LaPierre asked that the White House ‘stop the games’ over gun control legislation, people familiar with the meeting said,” the Times said.
The report said it was not clear whether Trump or LaPierre raised the prospect of financial support.
The White House confirmed Trump and LaPierre’s meeting to TPM but declined to comment on what they discussed.
For its part, the NRA has been in turmoil for months, engaged in multiple lawsuits with its former partner Ackerman McQueen and beset with internal fighting.
Read the Times’ report here.
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/nra- ... un-control
News Analysis: Ukraine saga reveals how Trump has been aided and shielded by loyalists
Soon after President Trump took office nearly three years ago, he demanded to know who would serve as his Roy Cohn, the infamous bare-knuckled lawyer who had once defended him, mob bosses and gossipy celebrities in New York.
Judging by the whistleblower complaint at the heart of the impeachment inquiry, the president finally seems to have gotten his wish.
Not only does the complaint detail the president’s efforts to get Ukraine to investigate his political enemies, it suggests a deep bench of officials were willing to participate in his scheme or help keep it under wraps. Although the whistleblower said other White House officials were “deeply disturbed” by Trump’s actions, none have come forward.
The scandal — potentially the most dangerous of Trump’s tenure —is a vivid reminder of how he has bent the White House apparatus to serve him personally, much like the gilt-edged private company in Manhattan that bears his name and served as his launchpad into politics.
On Thursday, an enraged Trump lashed out at the whistleblower, at Democrats, and at the media, even as he seemed to joke about his yearning to stay at the pinnacle of power, a forever fixture in the global spotlight.
“We’re looking good for another four years, and then if we want to another four and another four,” Trump told a private event in New York before he returned to Washington.
The complaint, which was partially redacted, portrays a president willing to hijack foreign policy to further his political interests. In July, Trump delayed nearly $400 million in foreign aid to Ukraine, a country that has been fending off Russian-backed separatists, and then told its president, Volodymyr Zelensky, a week later that he wanted a “favor.”
Trump urged Zelensky to investigate CrowdStrike, a California-based cybersecurity company that had worked for Democrats in 2016, and Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden, whose son Hunter had served on the board of a Ukrainian energy company.
According to a White House account of the call, Trump urged Zelensky several times to deal with America’s top law enforcement official, Atty. Gen. William Barr, and talk to his personal lawyer, Rudolph W. Giuliani, who does not work for the government, about the investigations.
Two months earlier, according to the complaint, Trump had instructed Vice President Mike Pence to cancel plans to attend Zelensky’s inauguration and sent Energy Secretary Rick Perry instead. Trump also made clear he would not meet or talk with the new Ukranian president unless he was willing to “play ball” on the investigations, the whistleblower wrote.
Giuliani already was serving as Trump’s private emissary to Ukraine’s new government. He urged officials to investigate issues that could help the president, spoke with State Department officials about his efforts, and pushed to get the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine recalled.
A career foreign service officer who had urged Ukraine’s government to crack down on corruption, Marie Louise Yovanovitch was ordered home in May. Giuliani told a Ukrainian journalist that she had been “part of the efforts against the president.”
“I heard from multiple U.S. officials that they were deeply concerned by what they viewed as Mr. Giuliani’s circumvention of national security decision-making processes to engage with Ukrainian officials and relay messages back and forth between Kyiv and the president,” the whistleblower wrote.
On July 26, the day after Trump spoke by phone with Zelensky about Biden, two senior State Department officials visited the new leader in Kyiv.
Kurt Volker, the top U.S. envoy for Ukraine, and Gordon Sondland, the U.S. ambassador to the European Union, “provided advice ... about how to ‘navigate’ the demands that the president had made.”
Back in Washington, White House officials worried about how to handle records of Trump’s phone call with Zelensky. Roughly a dozen White House officials — a mix of policy experts and duty officers in the Situation Room — had listened in, a standard practice for communications between heads of state.
Some were so disturbed by Trump’s comments that they began talking to White House lawyers about “what had transpired,” the whistleblower wrote.
But senior White House officials moved to “lock down” records of the call, the whistleblower wrote. They directed aides to move the electronic transcript to a computer system that normally holds highly classified material, a decision that one official described as “an abuse” because the call “did not contain anything remotely sensitive from a national security perspective,” according to the complaint.
More impeachment inquiry coverage
The whistleblower wrote it wasn’t the first time the White House had used the classified network “solely for the purpose of protecting politically sensitive — rather than national security sensitive — information.”
After the complaint was filed on Aug. 12, other officials also were willing to shield the president. Michael Atkinson, the intelligence community’s inspector general, said it was an “urgent concern” that required Congress to be provided a copy, but the acting intelligence director, Joseph Maguire, turned to the Justice Department for legal advice.
Barr has been one of Trump’s most implacable legal defenders, and government lawyers determined that Trump’s actions did not break the law, brushing off Atkinson’s concerns.
Despite being stymied by Maguire and the Justice Department, Atkinson notified the House Intelligence Committee of the impasse on Sept. 9, the first crack in the secrecy that had shielded Trump.
The complaint became public less than three weeks later.
https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/ ... -loyalists
by RocketMan » Sat Sep 28, 2019 11:35 am
Ukraine’s crisis was the latest to energize a club whose culture has come to be treated as normal—a culture in which top-tier lawyers, former U.S. public officials, and policy experts (and their progeny) cash in by trading on their connections and their access to insider policy information—usually by providing services to kleptocrats like Yanukovych. The renewed focus on Ukraine raises jangling questions: How did dealing in influence to burnish the fortunes of repugnant world leaders for large payoffs become a business model? How could America’s leading lights convince themselves—and us—that this is acceptable?
Let’s start with Hunter Biden. In April 2014, he became a director of Burisma, the largest natural-gas producer in Ukraine. He had no prior experience in the gas industry, nor with Ukrainian regulatory affairs, his ostensible purview at Burisma. He did have one priceless qualification: his unique position as the son of the vice president of the United States, newborn Ukraine’s most crucial ally. Weeks before Biden came on, Ukraine’s government had collapsed amid a popular revolution, giving its gas a newly strategic importance as an alternative to Russia’s, housed in a potentially democratic country. Hunter’s father was comfortably into his second term as vice president—and was a prospective future president himself.
There was already a template, in those days, for how insiders in a gas-rich kleptocracy could exploit such a crisis using Western “advisers” to facilitate and legitimize their plunder—and how those Westerners could profit handsomely from it. A dozen-plus years earlier, amid the collapse of the U.S.S.R. of which Ukraine was a part, a clutch of oligarchs rifled the crown jewels of a vast nation. We know some of their names, in some cases because of the work of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s office: Oleg Deripaska, Viktor Vekselberg, Dmitry Rybolovlev, Leonard Blavatnik. That heist also was assisted by U.S. consultants, many of whom had posts at Harvard and at least one of whom was a protégé of future Treasury Secretary Larry Summers.
Burisma’s story is of that stripe.
by seemslikeadream » Sat Sep 28, 2019 12:06 pm
The Tennessee Holler
Glorious- watch @KatyTurNBC absolutely humiliate Trump advisor @marc_lotter for his hypocrisy about the Biden’s when the Trump family is currently profiting from more foreign deals than we can even count.
https://twitter.com/TheTNHoller/status/ ... 1639181313
by RocketMan » Sat Sep 28, 2019 1:55 pm
by seemslikeadream » Sat Sep 28, 2019 1:56 pm
In Death, Khashoggi Exposes the Corruption of Kushner and Trump
There’s a word for what may be going on here: espionage
Greg Olear
A report released yesterday by the CIA concluded that Jamal Khashoggi, a prominent Saudi journalist who was living in the United States, was assassinated on direct orders from Mohammed bin Salman (MbS), crown prince of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The Kingdom dispatched a 15-man “death squad” to Istanbul, comprised of members of MbS’s own security detail, to make the hit. On Oct. 2, the assassins concocted a reason to lure Khashoggi into the consulate. There, they spent seven full minutes torturing him, slicing off his fingers and other body parts while he was still alive. Then they killed him and hacked up the remains with a bone saw.
Turkey jails more journalists than almost any other country in the world. Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, is a full-blown dictatorship.
This is at odds with the Saudi cover story: that Khashoggi, a portly man of letters a few days away from his 60th birthday, initiated a fistfight with his interrogators and died of a sedative overdose given when he was restrained—at which point his body was sawed into pieces for undisclosed reasons. The Saudi prosecutor is seeking the death penalty for five members of the “death squad.” The CIA explanation also conflicts with the version provided by the Turkish government: that Khashoggi was strangled to death immediately upon entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul and was no longer alive when his body was dismembered. However, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey has been insistent that Khashoggi’s death was no accident.
Both Turkey and Saudi Arabia are nominally U.S. allies. We need the former for its strategic military bases and the latter for both its oil and its vast investment capital. Despite being a NATO member and ostensibly a democracy, Turkey jails more journalists than almost any other country in the world. Saudi Arabia, meanwhile, is a full-blown dictatorship, and despite a valiant attempt to portray MbS as a Western-style reformer, the crown prince has tightened, not loosened, his grip on absolute power in Saudi Arabia.
Putting aside the heinousness of the actual crime—to say nothing of MbS’s betrayal of the members of his own security detail, five of whom will likely be executed for their role in the operation—the Khashoggi affair has dramatic significance to the United States in general and to Donald Trump and Jared Kushner in particular.
This week, Trump floated the idea of handing over the Turkish dissident Fethullah Gülen, who now lives in Pennsylvania, to Erdogan’s government. Gülen’s extradition has long been on Erdogan’s wish list; recall that disgraced former national security adviser Mike Flynn was offered $15 million by the Turks to achieve this result. Gülen, a Muslim cleric, is the leader of a reform movement focused on education and religious tolerance; his beef with Erdogan involves the latter’s corruption. To hand a moderate reformer to an autocrat for certain execution flies in the face of everything the United States stands for. But Trump would certainly do just that—if enough could be gained for himself personally.
There is a term for the exchange of U.S. intelligence or, worse, policy for money: espionage.
With respect to the assassination, Trump and Kushner both have skin in the game. Saudi Arabia was the first state visit Trump made as president, a trip organized and pushed for by Kushner, who is chummy with MbS and has acted as the de facto ambassador to Saudi Arabia. Khashoggi was not banned from Saudi media for his criticisms of MbS, but rather for his criticisms of Donald Trump. More importantly, U.S. intelligence knew of a plan to lure Khashoggi back to arrest him, so the president and the de facto ambassador to Saudi Arabia must have also known. If they knew and did not share the information with Khashoggi, they are liable. Per the Washington Post:
Intelligence agencies have a ‘duty to warn’ people who might be kidnapped, seriously injured or killed, according to a directive signed in 2015. The obligation applies regardless of whether the person is a U.S. citizen. Khashoggi was a U.S. resident.
Why exactly are Trump and Kushner going to the mat for MbS? Is it to advance U.S. interests—or their own?
Last October, Jared Kushner paid an unannounced visit to Riyadh, where it’s reported that he stayed up until the wee hours talking “strategy” with the crown prince, apparently his new BFF. He allegedly gave MbS an “enemies list” culled from the classified president’s daily brief, which MbS seems to have used the following month to purge disloyal relatives from government and take their money. Also last October, Kushner’s company received a $57 million loan from Fortress Investment Group, which was recently purchased by SoftFund, a Saudi investment concern, to bail out its troubled property at One Journal Square in Jersey City. (A larger and more widely-reported loan, to bail out the troubled property at 666 Fifth Avenue, came the following summer, via Qatar.)
There is a term for the exchange of U.S. intelligence — or, worse, policy — for money. The term is espionage. It is punishable by death.
“For the record, I have no financial interests in Saudi Arabia,” Trump tweeted. “Any suggestion that I have is just more FAKE NEWS (of which there is plenty)!” This is skirting the truth at best, and at worst, it’s an outright lie, as the Washington Post reported.
Trump famously demands loyalty from his subordinates. But is he loyal to his country—or only himself? The American people need to know.
https://medium.com/s/story/in-death-kha ... 6c85e659aa
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