Category: Russia

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Donald Trump Espionage Foreign Policy Russia Vladimir Putin

Top Secret Intel File On Russia Missing – Last Seen Before Trump Left Office

A file containing classified information about Russia and Russian efforts to influence the 2016 election disappeared in the last days of the Trump administration and has yet to be found, according to a terrifying report from CNN.

The binder contained raw intelligence the US and its NATO allies collected on Russians and Russian agents, including sources and methods that informed the US government’s assessment that Russian President Vladimir Putin sought to help Trump win the 2016 election, sources tell CNN.

The intelligence was so sensitive that lawmakers and congressional aides with top secret security clearances were able to review the material only at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia, where their work scrutinizing it was itself kept in a locked safe.

The file was last seen at the White House when Trump sought to declassify it for public release. The disgraced former president has long been obsessed with news reports suggesting that the Kremlin actively worked to get him elected instead of then-Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.

Additionally, the Russia binder wasn’t among the classified documents found when the FBI searched Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in August of last year, raising new questions about what might have become of the dossier.

New information suggests that the file was taken by former chief of staff Mark Meadows, CNN notes.

Cassidy Hutchinson, one of Meadows’ top aides, testified to Congress and wrote in her memoir that she believes Meadows took home an unredacted version of the binder. She said it had been kept in Meadows’ safe and that she saw him leave with it from the White House.

“I am almost positive it went home with Mr. Meadows,” Hutchinson told the January 6 committee in closed-door testimony, according to transcripts released last year.

George Terwilliger, an attorney for Meadows, denied his client is in possession of the file, remarking, “Anyone and any entity suggesting that he is responsible for anything missing does not have facts and should exercise great care before making false allegations.”

If the information is now in the hands of the Kremlin, has U.S. national security been compromised? And if so, what long-term ramifications could that pose for the overall security of the United States?

Perhaps members of the Trump administration, including the ex-president, need to be brought before a Senate committee and forced to testify under oath. After all, if they have nothing to hide, they should be eager to cooperate.

 

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Donald Trump Espionage Foreign Policy Russia

New Questions Raised About Trump Possibly Sharing Intel Info That Led To The Attack On Israel

A 2017 meeting failed former president Donald Trump held in the Oval Office with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Russia’s ambassador to the United States, Sergey Kislyak, is once again in the spotlight as questions about how Israel could have been so unprepared for the Hamas terror attack are being raised, with some suggesting that intelligence data Trump shared with the two Russians may have found its way into the hands of Iran, which passed it along to Hamas to aid their planning of the deadly assault launched from the Gaza Strip.

Israel, we later learned, was the source of that intelligence, as NBC noted in May 2017:

The link to Israel was first reported by the New York Times a day after it was disclosed that Trump gave Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov intelligence about a laptop bomb threat and revealed the Syrian city where the information was collected.

And now Senior White House Communications Adviser Andrew Bates is hinting that Trump may have been partially responsible for the Hamas attack that has left over 1,000 Israelis dead.

According to Mediaite, Bates made the claim in response to a Twitter post from former Trump administration official Stephen Miller.

That response from Bates resulted in others suggesting that Trump may be partially to blame for Hamas’ attack.

The ex-president’s niece, Mary, pulled no punches.

Soon there was a deluge of discussion and accusation on Twitter.

It’s important to note that at the moment there is no direct evidence the information Trump shared with the two Russians was used to plan the Hamas attack on Israel, but shouldn’t there at least be congressional investigations into the matter? And if a link can be proven, what additional crimes should Donald Trump be charged with?

 

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Crime Donald Trump Russia Social Media WTF?!

Trump Suggests He Might ‘Fly Far Away, Maybe To Russia’ To Avoid Criminal Trials

Clearly feeling the pressure of the four criminal trials he’s facing, disgraced one-term, twice-impeached, and multiply-indicted former president Donald Trump held a pity party for himself on social media and openly suggested that he might abscond to Russia in order to avoid having to serve a day in prison for his crimes.

On Monday, attorneys for the failed ex-president reached a deal with Fulton County, Georgia District Attorney Fani Willis to surrender in Atlanta on Thursday, Aug. 24 for arraignment, booking, and processing. After he posts a $200,00 bail, Trump will be allowed to return home.

However, shortly after news of the surrender deal was made, Trump posted this on his struggling Truth Social site:

The failed District Attorney of Fulton County (Atlanta), Fani Willis, insisted on a $200,000 Bond from me. I assume, therefore, that she thought I was a “flight” risk – I’d fly far away, maybe to Russia, Russia, Russia, share a gold domed suite with Vladimir, never to be seen or heard from again. Would I be able to take my very “understated” airplane with the gold TRUMP affixed for all to see. Probably not, I’d be much better off flying commercial – I’m sure nobody would recognize me!

Trump has already been warned in other jurisdictions that he should be careful about what he posts on social media, and yet he’s now suggesting he might want to flee to Russia, which doesn’t have an extradition treaty with the United States.

Even if Trump is just joking (is he?), any accused criminal defendant who made a similar posting would likely be in custody and held without bond until their trial. Yet Donnie continues to walk free.

 

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Crime Donald Trump Espionage Russia

Did Trump’s Motive For Stealing Classified Documents Involve Russia?

As he continues to investigate the matter of classified documents former president Donald Trump illegally removed from the White House and took with him to Mar-a-Lago when he left office, Special Counsel Jack Smith is focusing in on Russia as the motive for why the failed ex-president took thousands of secret files and stored them at his Palm Beach golf resort.

In what may wind up being the greatest irony of all, according to Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Murray Waas, Special Counsel Smith and a grand jury he impaneled believe Trump’s obsession with Russia led him to steal the information.

As he left office, Waas has learned, Trump desperately tried to declassify thousands of pages of secret documents that detailed Russia’s efforts to help defeat Hillary Clinton in the 2016 presidential election.

But Trump was stymied in his efforts to make the records public, leading the outgoing president to rage to aides that the documents would never see the light of day.

Now, sources close to Special Counsel Jack Smith’s investigation tell me that prosecutors have questioned at least three people about whether Trump’s frustrations may have been a motive in Trump taking thousands of pages of classified papers from the White House to Mar-A-Largo, in potential violation of federal law. One of those people was compelled to testify before a federal grand jury, the sources say.

The sources say that prosecutors appear to believe the episode may be central to determining Trump’s intent for his unauthorized removal from the White House of the papers.  Insight into the president’s frame of mind—his intent and motivation, are likely to be the foundational building blocks of any case that the special counsel considers seeking against Trump.

That has led Smith to take a close look at conversations between the White House counsel, the Justice Department, and then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows in the last frantic hours of the Trump administration.

The sources familiar with some aspects of the special counsel’s investigation further disclosed to me that prosecutors sought information regarding the following issues:   the witnesses were asked about any conversations they personally had with then-president Trump or any of their White House colleagues about the Russia papers; they were asked about conversations between senior Justice Department officials and attorneys with the White House counsel’s office, including two former senior lawyers in the office, John Eisenberg and Pat Philbin, regarding Trump’s presidential order to declassify the Russia papers; and they also were asked about the circumstances surrounding a memo written by Trump’s then Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, the day following Trump’s declassification order, in which Meadows appeared to reverse course and related that the papers would not be released before the concerns of other agencies regarding the Privacy Act were fully assuaged.

“It was very clear from what they asked that their emphasis was on Trump and Meadows,” one person said.

Another former aide to Trump, Kash Patel, has publicly stated that he saw all of the records the disgraced ex-president wanted declassified, telling Breitbart:

 “It’s information that Trump felt spoke to matters regarding everything from Russiagate to the Ukraine impeachment fiasco to major national security matters of great public importance—anything the president felt [the public] had a right to know is in there and more.”

So it was Russia that allegedly helped elect Trump, Russia that led to his impeachment, and Russia that may wind up sending him to prison for the rest of his life if Smith’s investigation proves Russiagate was what Trump clung to even after he left the White House.

Right about now, Donald Trump is probably wishing he had never heard of Russia or his BFF, Vladimir Putin.

 

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Donald Trump Russia

FBI Raids Condo Owned By Two Russians At Trump Towers In Florida

Though the Trump Tower in New York is probably much more well-known than any other property that carries the name of the indicted and twice-impeached former president/sex offender, all of the attention this week has been on Trump Towers located at Sunny Isles Beach in Florida.

On Thursday, according to The Miami Herald, FBI agents raided Trump Tower III in Florida, which just so happens to be owned by two Russians.

A squad of FBI special agents, assisted by local police, descended on Trump Tower III at 15811 Collins Ave. to carry out a search of unit 4102. It’s owned by a shell company, MIC-USA LLC, that is controlled by two Russian businessmen, Oleg Sergeyevich Patsulya and Agunda Konstantinovna Makeeva, according to state corporation records.

On Friday, a spokesman for the FBI’s Miami field office said it “was conducting court-ordered law enforcement activity in the vicinity of that location,” but provided no other information.

Sunny Isles Beach has been called “Little Moscow” because it serves as a home to a large number of Russian expatriates, some of whom expressed worries when Russia invaded Ukraine last year. In response, the U.S. government began cracking down with sanctions against oligarchs who are believed to hide their wealth by purchasing real estate in South Florida and other U.S. locations.

Trump agreed to have his name placed on the three Sunny Isles Beach condos before he became president in 2016. It was believed doing so would help promote sales of the units.

The Herald also reports that “MIC-USA … acquired the three-bedroom, three-bath condo residence at Trump Tower III for $1.65 million a decade ago, according to Miami-Dade property records.

In 2020, BAC Florida Bank, which provided financing for the purchase, sued Patsulya and Makeeva, claiming they defaulted on their $975,000 mortgage. The dispute was resolved later that year, though it’s not clear how from the court records. MIC-USA, controlled by the two Russians, continued to own the 41st-floor unit at Trump Tower III.

Though he has denied any connections to Russia, the former president’s son, Eric, said in 2014 that the Trump Organization got significant funding from Russian sources, according to The Hill:

”I said, ‘Eric, who’s funding? I know no banks — because of the recession, the Great Recession — have touched a golf course. You know, no one’s funding any kind of golf construction. It’s dead in the water the last four or five years,’”  the writers told WBUR.

“And this is what he said. He said, ‘Well, we don’t rely on American banks. We have all the funding we need out of Russia.’ I said, ‘Really?’ And he said, ‘Oh, yeah. We’ve got some guys that really, really love golf, and they’re really invested in our programs. We just go there all the time.’”