The Unofficial List of 35 Reasons Why I Am Suspicious of Donald Trump’s Relationship With Russia
as of: Jan. 16, 2019
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The Trump Organization has a long financial history with Russia that was brought about because US Banks stopped making loans to the Trump Organization a decade ago. (They no longer trusted his financial acumen.) In 2008, Donald Trump Jr. addressed this issue by stating that the Trump Organization could get all the funds it needed from Russia
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The only bank that continued to make loans to the Trump Organization in the past decade is Deutsche Bank, which has been sanctioned for laundering money for Russian oligarchs, and currently is under investigation again for the same offense
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In the early part of his career, Donald Trump proclaimed himself “The King of Debt” and used bank loans to finance notable failures like his purchase of the Plaza Hotel in New York. Over the past ten years, the Trump Organization has made its major purchases for cash, using amounts of cash inconsistent with the Trump Organization’s actual cash flow. The use of cash could indicate money laundering and if the money is coming from Russian… well “follow the money”
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Trump could probably clear up the matter of his financial dealings with Russia if he released his tax returns but he is the only modern presidential candidate who refuses to do so. He claimed he could not do so because returns were being audited, although the IRS said this was not the case. He promised to release returns when the audits were finished but did not do so.
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During the campaign for President, Donald Trump openly asked Russia “if you are listening” to find Hillary Clinton’s emails
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There is a broad consensus among US intelligence agencies that Russian organizations hacked Democrats during the campaign and released this material through Wikileaks. Details of this can be seen in the Mueller indictment of Russian individuals and agencies involved in the leaks.
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During the Trump/Putin Helsinki summit, Putin stated in a press conference that he favored the election of Donald Trump.
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At the Helsinki Summit, when Trump was asked about the Russian hacking during a joint press conference with Putin, Trump said he accepted Putin’s denials over the findings of all US intelligence agencies
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Roger Stone, an associate of Trump’s had several meetings with Wikileaks founder Julian Assange during the election and announced in advance that the leak of emails from John Podesta (Clinton campaign manager) was coming
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The Trump campaign requested and got a change in the Republican Platform dropping opposition to the Russian seizure of Crimea
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Trump and many of his associates initially insisting that there were no such contacts between the Trump campaign and Russian officials. Many people lied about this. To date, 101 meetings between Trump campaign and transition officials and Russian officials and oligarchs have been documented. Those who lied include former Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Donald Trump Jr. Michael Flynn and, of course, President Trump himself
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Trump campaign foreign policy advisor George Papadopoulos told an Australian diplomat during the campaign that “we are getting a lot of help from Russia.” When that diplomat reported this to the FBI, that triggered the initial FBI investigation into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia
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When he learned about the Papadopoulos claim, Jeff Sessions denied that either he or candidate Trump had ever met Papadopoulos, but there is a photograph of the three of them and others gathered in discussion around a conference table during the campaign. One more lie.
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Donald Trump Jr., Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner met with Russian officials at Trump Tower during the spring of 2016 to discuss the Russians providing dirt on Hillary Clinton
- · The Trump campaign denied that the meeting in Trump Tower took place, until it was obvious that it had occurred
- · The Trump campaign lied about who was in the meeting, until reports of who was there from the Russian side contradicted that lie.
- · Donald Trump lied about the subject of the meeting, insisting it was called to discuss adoptions. He put this message out the day after initiating an unscheduled one on one discussion with Vladimir Putin in Hamburg. There is no US record of that meeting. The only attendees were Trump, Putin and a Russian translator. Interestingly, in spreading the phony story about the Trump Tower meeting Trump told a reporter that claims the Russians had interfered in the Presidential election were false, because any Russian effort would have gone undetected “because they are experts”. A week later Trump told the New York Times that the meeting with Trump was primarily focused on adoption.
- · The Trump campaign lied about the identity of a Russian lawyer in the meeting – Veselnitskaya – claiming she was an independent Russian attorney interested in the adoption issue. Veselnitskaya has now been indicted (not by Mueller) on charges of assisting Russian oligarchs with money laundering
- · When Donald Trump Jr. received the email inviting him to come to a meeting to get Russian dirt on Hillary Clinton, he emailed back, “I love it”. This is prima fascie evidence of entering into a criminal conspiracy. What he failed to do was report this illegal overture to the FBI.
- · Donald Trump insists that he was unware of the Trump Tower meeting. Donald Trump Jr. gave the House Intelligence Committee his phone records and they show he made call as soon as the meeting ended, but he blacked out the recipient of the call. Devin Nunes, as Committee Chair, refused to subpoena the record to find out whom Trump Jr. had called. (More to come on this since Adam Schiff has indicated he will subpoena that record now that he is chair.)
- · We know from Mueller’s indictments that Russia greatly accelerated its hacking operations immediately after the Trump Tower Meeting
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On the topic of Trump’s praise for Russian hacking ability, during his brief time in the White House, Anthony Scaramucci told Jake Tapper that an anonymous source had assured him that Russian hackers were too talented to have been caught and thus could not have been the ones interfering in the election. Tapper complained that Scaramucci that he was citing an anonymous source after criticizing Trump’s opponents’ use of anonymous sources, Scaramucci replied “How about it’s the President Jake? I talked to him yesterday.”
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Paul Manafort was engaged as Trump campaign manager despite the fact that he was heavily in debt to a Russian oligarch and had worked to promote Russian interests in the Ukraine. Manafort gave a Russian official secret internal Trump campaign poll data, the sort of information that would have been extremely valuable in targeting the Russian social media/disinformation campaign
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Donald Trump lied to hide the ongoing negotiations to build a Trump Tower Moscow during the campaign. Doing so, when the Russians were fully aware of the negotiations, gave the Russians “kompromat” – the sort of blackmail material they use to control people
- · The Trump Organization used VTB Bank in Russia as the lead bank for this deal, despite the fact that VTB is sanctioned by the US government
- · The Trump Organization is reported to have offered Vladimir Putin a penthouse valued at $50M in the deal as a bribe, which would be a clear violation of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act
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During the Presidential transition, soon to be named National Security Advisor Michael Flynn met with Russian officials to discuss eliminating Obama-imposed sanctions. Since this was illegal, Flynn lied about it
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When the Acting Attorney General informed President Trump that Flynn – now National Security Advisor – was compromised by Russia, Trump kept Flynn in office for almost a month rather than removing him immediately
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As a candidate and in office, Trump has repeatedly attacked NATO going as far to say “NATO is as bad as NAFTA.” Recent reports say that Trump has proposed on several occasions that the US unilaterally withdraw from NATO. This would destroy NATO and fulfill one of Vladimir Putin’s greatest foreign policy objectives
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Donald Trump lied about the reason he fired James Comey as head of the FBI, claiming it was over Comey’s handling of Hillary Clinton. A few days later, Trump told Lester Holt on live TV that he fired Comey to end the Russia investigation
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The next week, in the oval office Trump bragged to Russian ambassador about firing Comey to stop “The Russia thing”
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During that meeting, Trump leaked sensitive Israeli intelligence to the Russian ambassador
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In the same meeting, Trump insisted there would be no press photographers. US press were barred, but Russian press photographers were let in and released photos of the meeting
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Trump supports pro-Russian leaders (Victor Orban in Hungary and Marine Le Pen in France) while never praising democratically elected leaders of US allies
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Donald Trump has praised Putin as a “strong leader” on several occasions. Trump congratulated Putin on winning a rigged election victory even while holding note from staff saying “DO NOT CONGRATULATE”
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Trump’s trade war with China has resulted in the Chinese ending all purchases of soy beans from the United States and then choosing Russia as their new supplier, giving a boost to the Russian economy
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Trump decided to abruptly withdraw US troops from Syria, apparently without consulting the State or Defense Departments. This action meets another of Putin’s foreign policy goals, strengthening Russia in the region. The Defense Secretary resigned in protest
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Trump has defended the Russian invasion of Afghanistan using Russian Talking points – claiing int was to stop terrorism in Russia. There had been no Afghani terrorism in Russia; the invasion was carried out to prop up a faltering Russian puppet government in Kabul
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In December, the Trump Administration abruptly dropped the sanctions the Obama Administration had placed on Russian Oligarch Derispaska because of Russian interference in the election. Derispaska was Paul Manfort’s boss in the Ukraine. The administration got nothing in return, this appears to be a favor to a close associate of Putin.
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Trump has repeatedly attacked American institutions: the two-party system; the courts; and many agencies of the government. His de-legitimation of these institutions reinforces the Russian propaganda message that American ideals such as democracy and counter-vailing powers are phony.
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Trump has repeatedly attacked the American judicial system, for instance, characterizing the execution of a legal search warrant at Michael Cohen’s office a “break-in”. His de-legitimation of the judicial process reinforces the Russian propaganda message that American ideals such as due process are phony.
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Trump and his media supporters have consistently attacked the FBI and the Justice Departments with a focus on individuals who have made their careers in Russian counter-intelligence. The damage done to Russian counter-intelligence by these attacks clearly works in Russia’s favor
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Trump has gone out of his way to assure that there are no US records of his five (to date) private conversations with Putin. This is unprecedented for an American President
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In a softball interview with Jeanine Pirro, Trump failed to deny he was a Russian agent when Pirro asked him