Throughout the 1990s, untold millions from the former Soviet Union flowed into Trump’s luxury developments and Atlantic City casinos. But all the money wasn’t enough to save Trump from his own failings as a businessman. He owed $4 billion to more than 70 banks, with a mind-boggling $800 million of it personally guaranteed. For most developers, the situation would have spelled financial ruin. But fortunately for Trump, Russian mobsters came to his aid. Dolly Lenz, a New York real estate broker, told USA Today that she sold some 65 units in Trump World Tower to Russians. Some of these were convicted for taking part in a massive international gambling and money-laundering syndicate that was run out of Trump Tower in New York. Another one-third of the units—more than 700 in all—were bought by shadowy shell companies that concealed the true owners. Condos in Trump Tower served as the headquarters for a “sophisticated money-laundering scheme” that moved an estimated $100 million out of the former Soviet Union, through shell companies in Cyprus, and into investments in the United States.

What will happen when Paul Manafort, the first likely Russia domino, finally falls?
 

How exactly do you have “no contact with Russians” when you choose to bring two Russians, one of them a former government lawyer and the other an alleged military spy, right into the heart of your campaign?, U.S. intel agencies recorded Russian agents discussing a request for “help” in their campaign by Paul Manafort, who was the third Trump campaign member in that meeting besides Don Jr. and Jared Kushner. In the summer of 2016, US intelligence agencies noticed a spate of curious contacts between Trump campaign associates and suspected Russian intelligence, according to current and former US officials briefed on the investigation… CNN has learned that investigators became more suspicious when they turned up intercepted communications that U.S. intelligence agencies collected among suspected Russian operatives discussing their efforts to work with Manafort, who served as campaign chairman, to coordinate information that could damage Hillary Clinton's election prospects, the US officials say. The suspected operatives relayed what they claimed were conversations with Manafort, encouraging help from the Russians. Manafort secretly worked for a Russian billionaire to advance the interests of Russian President Vladimir Putin a decade ago and proposed an ambitious political strategy to undermine anti-Russian opposition across former Soviet republics, The Associated Press has learned. The work appears to contradict assertions by the Trump administration and Manafort himself that he never worked for Russian interests. The reports we currently have of Manafort’s actions are that he attended a meeting with former Russian prosecutor Natalia Veselnitskaya, who secretly came to Trump Tower to meet with Donald Jr. She brought former Russian Intelligence officer Rinat Ahkmetshin with her, who has been reportedly linked to various acts of corporate hacking, in order to supposedly provide the Trump campaign with “negative information on Hillary Clinton” that would have helped their campaign because that’s something the “Russian Government wanted” to do. Less than two weeks before Donald Trump accepted the Republican presidential nomination, his campaign chairman offered to provide briefings on the race to a Russian billionaire closely aligned with the Kremlin, according to people familiar with the discussions. Paul Manafort made the offer in an email to an overseas intermediary, asking that a message be sent to Oleg Deripaska, an aluminum magnate with whom Manafort had done business in the past, these people said.
“If he needs private briefings we can accommodate,” Manafort wrote in the July 7, 2016, email, portions of which were read to The Washington Post along with other Manafort correspondence from that time. Manafort proposed in a confidential strategy plan as early as June 2005 that he would influence politics, business dealings and news coverage inside the United States, Europe and the former Soviet republics to benefit the Putin government, even as U.S.-Russia relations under Republican President George W. Bush grew worse. Manafort pitched the plans to Russian aluminum magnate Oleg Deripaska, a close Putin ally with whom Manafort eventually signed a $10 million annual contract beginning in 2006, according to interviews with several people familiar with payments to Manafort and business records obtained by the AP. Manafort and Deripaska maintained a business relationship until at least 2009, according to one person familiar with the work.
Just to be clear, Manafort did this illegally, because he failed to register as a foreign agent at the time. In fact, he didn’t finally register until June of this year. The problem now appears to be that Manafort didn’t exactly end this relationship with Deripaska in 2009, when Medvedev became president of the Russian Federation and Putin became prime minister. It seems to have continued.
And there’s also the problem that even without registering under FARA, doing any work for Deripaska was potentially problematic under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. Deripaska also faces possible money laundering charges because he’s alleged to have ties to the Russian mafia (although in fairness it should be noted that he later sued the AP for defamation over these claims). Just to sum up, Donald Trump has claimed he had “nothing to do with Russians,” that no one in his campaign had “anything to do with Russians.”

Who cares? Hillary lost and that is a fact. It ain't gonna change. Live with it. The Russians are just a conspiracy to cover the left's embarrassment.

IRS shares information with special counsel in Russia probe
 

Mueller is guided by a written order issued by Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein in May which allows the special counsel to investigate "any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation." The IRS Criminal Investigation agents had been working with the FBI to investigate Manafort since before the election in a similar probe that centered on possible money laundering and tax fraud issues. The new information about the depth of IRS involvement renews questions surrounding the controversial issue of President Donald Trump's tax returns, which he refused to release during the campaign despite decades of precedent by presidential candidates. Mueller's team has warned Manafort that they are working to charge him with possible tax and financial crimes, an indication the investigation could be in an advanced stage.

You're probably upset that NFL players are protesting the unfair treatment of some of our citizens and think your reaction is patriotic, while at the same time ignoring an attack on our nation by a hostile foreign government. I believe you need to widen your sources of information to that "mainstream media" Trump is so afraid you'll listen to.

"In the past we’ve always come together as a country when we’ve been attacked by a foreign enemy, whether it was Pearl Harbor or 9/11. And for this, for the first time, [it] is not so.” — Rob Reiner

f Trump begins blocking the progress of the investigation with pardons, federal courts can expect some exercise. But Mueller doesn’t want to leave his case in the hands of Trump-appointed judges. Acting as Mueller’s top legal counsel, Michael Dreeben has been researching past pardons and determining what, if any, limits exist. Dreeben’s brief is to make sure the special counsel’s prosecutorial moves are legally airtight. Dreeben, 62, built that expertise over three decades as an appeals lawyer at the Justice Department. As a deputy solicitor general, he’s pored over prosecutors’ moves in more than a thousand federal criminal prosecutions and defended many of them from challenges all they way to the nation’s highest court. Dreeben is the expert in how to make charges stick.

Mellinhead still talking to herself...too bad Obamma did nothing to prevent anyone from influencing an election..
Mueller leaked to the media and should be disbarred.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G890A using Tapatalk

What a load of crap! In other words, it's against the law to make money in Russia. ... yeah right.

Femo-Fascists can't stand the reality of Trump's winning because it's an affront to their conceit, i.e. their sense of superiority.


.

Meanwhile, "Liberty? What's that?...

For some reason there are many celebrity birthday wish threads started in this political forum. I am sure there is a reason for it. Something a new person wouldn't understand. However, it does bring to mind an old movie that seems relevant to this subject. I do not know if anyone remembers the old movie "The Russians are Coming." I really didn't care for the movie, but the title seems to fit the narrative.

Democrats in Congress say we've only seen the "tip of the iceberg" when it comes to social media and Russian interference, but here's a top Republican saying it, Sen. John Cornyn: "It's consistent with everything else we've seen in terms of Russian active measures -- a combination of cyber, of propaganda and paid and social media," he said. "So, we're just looking at the tip of the iceberg."

It's against the law to make money in Russia...and then lie to Congress about it. Senate Intelligence committee member Senator Coons wrote a memo:"Below is a statute to keep in mind in regards to Donald Trump Jr.'s testimony today," then he simply laid out the legal statute for lying to Congress. Mueller recognizes that Russian organized crime and sophisticated financial transactions involving them are going to be right at the center and has hired Lisa Page and Andrew Weissmann. Page is a trial attorney in the Justice Department's organized-crime section whose cases centered on international organized crime and money laundering, and Weissmann is a seasoned prosecutor who oversaw cases against high-ranking organized criminals on Wall Street in the early 1990s and, later, against 30 people implicated in the Enron fraud scandal.

It always strikes me that we have a sitting President who actually opposes investigating a foreign power interfering in our election.....he actually continues to call it a hoax, and fake news.

That is mind boggling to me. How much more of an anti american attitude can you have.

But he allows himself from our oval office to make serious felonious accusations about so many people, never supplying substance to anything he says.

Hard to draw up a more anti american attitude that what he has.

When The Washington Post reported that Robert Mueller, the special counsel overseeing the FBI's probe, was investigating whether Trump obstructed justice, the Republican National Committee did not dispute the accuracy of the report. Neither did Trump's lawyer, Marc Kasowitz.

Even more amazing, mind boggling and disgusting, are the Anti-American citizens of this great nation...who still blindly follow him. :ohdear: