Tornado Alley (PROG)

[fuagf]

15 Saudis in 9/11; 15 Saudis in Khashoggi disappearance.

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Day 637: Personal commitments.

"The Saudi Cover-Up Crumbles"

.. with links ..

10/18/2018 Updated: 10/18/2018 11:44:31 AM PDT

1/ Mike Pompeo said the U.S. will give Saudi Arabia "a few more days" to investigate the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi while the Trump administration and the Saudi royal family look for an explanation that doesn't implicate Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Pompeo said the Saudis could be trusted to "conduct a complete, thorough investigation," because they "made a personal commitment to me, and the Crown Prince also made a personal commitment to the president." Asked if his administration was trying to give the Saudis room to come up with an explanation absolving Mohammed, Trump said: "I'm not giving cover at all. They are an ally." (NBC News / Washington Post / Politico / CNN)

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Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin will not attend next week's investment conference in Saudi Arabia after talking with Trump and Pompeo. (CNBC / Wall Street Journal / Politico / Washington Post / New York Times)

Republican lawmakers are threatening to sanction and end arms sales to the Saudis, despite Trump's objection to canceling a $110 billion arms deal. He claims the deal would create 500,000 U.S. jobs. Additionally, a bipartisan group of senators have invoked the 2016 Magnitsky Act, giving the administration 120 days to respond to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee about potential sanctions against officials responsible for human rights violations. (Bloomberg)

The U.S. received $100 million from Saudi Arabia the same day Mike Pompeo arrived in Riyadh to discuss Khashoggi's disappearance. Saudi Arabia publicly pledged the payment to support U.S. stabilization efforts in northeastern Syria in August, but the timing of the transfer raised questions about a potential payoff as Riyadh tries to manage the fallout over Khashoggi's disappearance. (Washington Post)
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2/ U.S. intelligence agencies are confident that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was involved in the disappearance and murder of Jamal Khashoggi. While spy agencies haven't been able to collect direct evidence about whether Mohammed ordered the killing of Khashoggi or if his intention was to have Khashoggi captured and taken back to Saudi Arabia, circumstantial evidence points to the prince's involvement. (New York Times)

3/ A frequent companion of Saudi Arabia's crown prince entered the country's consulate in Istanbul hours before Khashoggi arrived. Maher Abdulaziz Mutreb was also seen outside the Saudi consul general's home, leaving a Turkish hotel with a large suitcase, and leaving Istanbul — all in the same day. (New York Times)

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One of the 15 suspects in the alleged murder of Khashoggi died in a "suspicious traffic accident." Mashal Saad al-Bostani was a member of the Saudi Royal Air Force and one of the 15 suspects who landed in Istanbul on Oct. 2 – the day that Khashoggi disappeared – and left the same day after visiting the Saudi consulate. (Yeni Safak / Business Insider / New York Post)

At least nine of 15 suspects identified by Turkish authorities worked for the Saudi security services, military or other government ministries. (New York Times)

4/ Aras Agalarov formed a U.S. shell company a month before the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting between Trump Jr. and Natalia Veselnitskaya, the Kremlin-linked Russian attorney offering damaging information about Hillary Clinton. The Russian billionaire moved almost $20 million to a U.S. bank account 11 days after the meeting using a company he formed anonymously with the help of an accountant who has had clients accused of money laundering and embezzlement. (The Guardian)

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The Re-up: Day 601. Federal investigators are looking into a series of suspicious financial transactions involving people who attended the 2016 Trump Tower meeting. The transfers reveal how Aras Agalarov, a Russian billionaire with strong ties to Trump and Putin, used overseas accounts to distribute money through a web of banks to himself, his son, and at least two people who attended the meeting. Investigators are focusing on two bursts of activity: one occurring shortly before the Trump Tower meeting and one immediately after the 2016 election. (BuzzFeed News / The Hill)

Notables.

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Don McGahn is out as White House counsel. McGahn planned to leave the White House this fall, but his exit was expedited after Trump announced Patrick Cipollone as his successor. Cippollone served as a Justice Department lawyer under the George H.W. Bush administration. (CNN / New York Times)

?? Who The Fuck Has Left The Trump Administration. A timeline of all the departures so far… (WTF Just Happened Today Community Forum)

Trump threatened to deploy the military to the U.S.-Mexico border and upend the reworked trade deal with Mexico and Canada if Central American countries don't stop a convoy of Honduran migrants making its way toward the U.S. (Bloomberg / The Guardian / Washington Post)

Robert Mueller is pushing Paul Manafort to provide information about Roger Stone, who may have communicated with Julian Assange or WikiLeaks about releasing hacked emails from Hillary Clinton's campaign. Manafort agreed to cooperate with the special counsel as part of pleading guilty to two counts of conspiracy. He is also awaiting sentencing on 18 counts of financial crimes. (ABC News)

Trump's lawyers called a sexual assault lawsuit by a former "The Apprentice" contestant "meritless" and "politically-motivated." Summer Zervos alleges that Trump groped and kissed her without her consent in 2007. (ABC News)

The Trump Organization sued the estate of a man who died in a Trump Tower apartment fire for $90,000 in unpaid maintenance fees. (NBC News)

With links - https://whatthefuckjusthappenedtoday.com/all/