Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

Re Kushner's saying he has never "relied on" Russian money

"In a statement he made in July to the Senate Intelligence Committee, Kushner said he never “relied on” Russian money to finance his private
business dealings. Kushner declined to comment, through a spokesman, on the reports about Milner and his social media investments."
from your .. U.S. COMMERCE SECRETARY INVESTS IN FIRM LINKED TO PUTIN FAMILY AND ALLIES, REPORTS SAY
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/us-commerce-secretary-invests-in-rm-linked-to-putin-family-and-allies-reports-say/2017/11/05/19148220-4084-4fc7-afe8-56338790e529_story.html?utm_term=.7d27be52ddcb

i drifted back to .. Jared Kushner’s Russia defense raises more questions than it answers

Maybe the Russians shouldn’t have gone to Jared.

Updated by Zack Beauchamp@[e-mail] Jul 24, 2017, 12:53pm EDT


(Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Jared Kushner really wants everyone to believe that he did nothing wrong.

Donald Trump’s son-in-law and top aide released a public statement .. https://assets.bwbx.io/documents/users/iqjWHBFdfxIU/rIRIxO_E2V9M/v0 .. about the Russia scandal on Monday morning, a preview of what he’s going to say in closed-door congressional testimony this week .. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/jared-kushner-russia-testimony-preview_us_59759838e4b09e5f6cd05c64 .

“I did not collude, nor know of anyone else in the campaign who colluded, with any foreign government. I had no improper contacts. I have not relied on Russian funds to finance my business activities in the private sector. I have tried to be fully transparent,” Kushner writes. “Hopefully, this puts these matters to rest.”

But a close read of the letter suggests that it does not, in fact, put these matters to rest. By Kushner’s own account, he met with Russian nationals four times during the presidential campaign and transition. His descriptions of these meetings are incomplete, full of unconfirmed details, and at times directly contradictory of other sources’ accounts of the same events.

[...] Then came Kushner's version of his suggestion to Kislyak of setting up a secure communication channel (inside the Washington Russian embassy) so that Flynn could receive Syrian info. from the Russians without snooping. We've read before that Kushner said Kislyak knocked it back. Then comes

"But this is a very different account of the meeting than what appeared in the Post. A number of US intelligence officials, according to the Post, seemed to believe the effort was a far more ambitious attempt to hide the Trump team’s communications from the US’s own spies. This would be incredibly nefarious: It would suggest that there was some information Kushner wanted to share with the Russians (or vice versa) but did not want anyone in the US government, let alone the American public, to know about.

There are only three possible options: The Post’s report is wrong, American spies misread the meeting, or Kushner is lying."

[...]

This letter reveals a ton of specific facts about collusion that set up Kushner for trouble

https://www.vox.com/world/2017/7/24/16019456/jared-kushner-russia-letter-statement

Again while reading all that thoughts of Mueller's looking into some serious Russian money laundering came
to mind which led to wondering if there were any updates on the Deutsche Bank case. This is the latest i found.

Deutsche Bank expects subpoenas over Trump-Russia investigation

Source reveals Robert Mueller’s team and Trump’s exclusive bankers have
established informal contacts and requests for information are forthcoming

This article is 3 months old

Stephanie Kirchgaessner and Oliver Laughland

Wednesday 19 July 2017 19.26 EDT


Deutsche’s relationship with Trump and questions about hundreds of millions in loans have dogged
the German bank and the White House for months. Photograph: Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters

Executives inside Deutsche Bank, Donald Trump’s personal bankers, are expecting that the bank will soon be receiving subpoenas or other requests for information from Robert Mueller .. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/robert-mueller , the special counsel who is investigating possible collusion between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign.

A person close to the matter who spoke to the Guardian on the condition of anonymity said Mueller’s team and the bank had already established informal contact in connection to the federal investigation.

There were signs this week that any effort by Mueller to to pursue documents about Trump’s personal finances will be met with intense criticism by the White House. When asked by the New York Times whether he believed Mueller would be crossing a red line if he expanded his inquiry to include an examination of Trump’s personal finances, the president said: “I think that’s a violation.”

--
Analysis How Donald Trump became Deutsche Bank's biggest headache
It’s no surprise the bank that likes to say yes to Trump is reviewing its arrangements with him now he is president
Read more > https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/feb/16/how-donald-trump-became-deutsche-bank-biggest-headache
--

Deutsche’s relationship with Trump and questions about hundreds of millions in loans have dogged the German bank and the White House for months. They have also been the subject of intense scrutiny among some Democrats on Capitol Hill .. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/may/24/deutsche-bank-trump-accounts-audit-democrats-russia , who have demanded the bank turn over detailed information about the president’s accounts.

The requests for information from Maxine Waters, the top Democrat on the House financial services committee, have focused on whether any Russian entities may have provided financial guarantees for the loans that were made to the president or his immediate family members.

The Guardian reported in February .. https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/feb/16/deutsche-bank-examined-trump-account-for-russia-links .. that the bank launched a review of Trump’s account earlier this year in order to gauge whether there were any suspicious connections to Russia and did not discover anything suspicious.

Ivanka Trump, the president’s daughter and adviser in the White House; her husband, Jared Kushner, who is also a presidential adviser; and Kushner’s mother, Seryl Stadtmauer, are all clients of Deutsche Bank .. https://www.theguardian.com/business/deutschebank .

US media outlets have reported that Mueller’s investigation into possible Russian collusion with the Trump campaign will include a close examination of the president’s finances and businesses. While Deutsche Bank did engage in banking transactions with Russian banks as late as 2005, including some loan activity, a person familiar with the matter said the activity was not related to Trump’s accounts or his family.

The president has decried the investigation into his campaign as “fake news” and has vociferously denied that the campaign ever colluded with Russian government officials to try to gain an edge in his 2016 race against the Democratic presidential nominee, Hillary Clinton.

Any move by Mueller’s team to pursue Trump’s personal financial records comes as the bank continues to negotiate a settlement with the Department of Justice over its so-called mirror trading scheme, in which the bank’s former Moscow branch is alleged to have allowed $10bn to flow out of Russia .. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jan/31/deutsche-bank-fined-630m-over-russia-money-laundering-claims . Democrats on Capitol Hill have been demanding answers about who might have benefited from the scheme.

Deutsche has been fined more than $6bn in connection to compliance failures since 2015.

According to an analysis by Bloomberg .. https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-12-22/deutsche-bank-s-reworking-a-big-trump-loan-as-inauguration-nears , Trump now owes Deutsche, his biggest creditor, about $300m. He has four large mortgages, all issued by Deutsche’s private bank. The loans are guaranteed against the president’s properties .. http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/09/trumps-conflict-interest-big-overseas-bank-getting-worse-minute : a new deluxe hotel in Washington DC’s Old Post Office building .. https://www.trumphotels.com/washington-dc/old-post-office-transformation , just around the corner from the White House; his Chicago tower hotel .. https://www.trumphotels.com/chicago/ ; and the Trump National Doral .. https://www.trumphotels.com/miami .. Miami resort.

A person close to the matter said other financial institutions with ties to Trump, including Bank of America, would also probably receive requests for information from Mueller’s team.

Lawrence Grayson, Bank of America spokesman, declined to comment on whether the bank had received or was anticipating any subpoenas for records from Mueller’s investigation.

Deutsche Bank did not respond to a request for comment. A spokesman for Mueller did not respond to a request for comment.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2017/jul/19/deutsche-bank-donald-trump-russia-investigation-subpoenas