Released Mueller documents reveal Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump enjoyed a vacation in Croatia 'with a Russian oligarch' and Wendi Deng - a meeting Steve Bannon thought was so dubious he planned to 'leverage' it against Trump's son-in-law Email was included in investigative documents released on Saturday by DOJ Bannon told Breitbart staffer that Kushner vacationed with 'Russian billionaire' Kushner was in Croatia with Ivanka in August 2016 at the height of the campaign Bannon told investigators that he thought the decision was 'questionable' New documents show Steve Bannon (above) hoped to 'leverage' Kushner's alleged vacation with a Russian billionaire A tranche of newly released documents from Special Counsel Robert Mueller's investigation have revealed that Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump took a vacation in Croatia with a mystery 'Russian billionaire' during the 2016 campaign. Also on the trip was and Rupert Murdoch's former wife Wendi Deng. According to the notes, former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon raised questions about the vacation and found it so dubious that he planned to 'leverage' the meetup with the Russian against Donald's Trump's son-in-law, Jared. The documents, including 274 pages of Mueller team interview notes, emails and other documents related to the investigation, were released on Saturday in response to a lawsuit from CNN and Buzzfeed. 'Bannon knew Kushner was on vacation off the coast of Croatia with a Russian Billionaire when Bannon took over the campaign,' a summary of an investigative interview with Bannon read. The summary said that Kushner was with Deng, the Russian billionaire, and the Russian's girlfriend, but it does not name the Russian. The documents included this summary of DOJ investigators' interview with Steve Bannon Bannon told friends in the intelligence community that he thought Kushner's choice of vacation company was 'questionable,' according to the interview summary. Kushner's and Ivanka Trump's vacation in August 2016 was previously documented in photos obtained by DailyMail.com, but the presence of a Russian billionaire had not been reported. Throughout the trip, Deng was photographed with Kushner and his wife Ivanka. In an email dated July 24, 2017 to an individual with a Breitbart domain email, Bannon referenced Kushner's vacation and appeared to indicate that the information, if reported and confirmed, could be valuable against Kushner. Bannon was widely known to be in a bitter power struggle with Kushner and Ivanka while serving in the White House, reportedly referring to the couple as the 'New York globalists.' 'He was on 'vacation' off the coast of Croatia with a Russian billionaire when I took over the campaign,' Bannon wrote to the Breitbart employee, whose name was redacted in the released documents. This email chain dated July 24, 2017 was part of the released documents 'How do we prove that?' the Breitbart employee replied. 'That's game set match.' Kushner and Ivanka Trump spent the Croatia vacation aboard the megayacht of billionaire Democrat donor David Geffen. David Geffen, who was one of the earliest supporters of Barack Obama and donated to both Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders in the 2016 primary, hosted Kushner and Ivanka Trump on his boat the Rising Sun. The couple was seen jet skiing in Croatia off the $200million boat, and later went sightseeing in Dubrovnik with Wendi Deng and Brian Grazer and his new wife Veronica. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...shner-Ivanka-vacationed-Russian-oligarch.html
Mueller documents: Manafort pushed Ukraine hack theory By Associated Press WASHINGTON — During the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort pushed the idea that Ukraine, not Russia, was behind the hack of the Democratic National Committee servers, Manafort’s deputy told investigators during the special counsel’s Russia probe. The unsubstantiated theory, advanced by President Donald Trump even after he took office, would later help trigger the impeachment inquiry now consuming the White House. Notes from an FBI interview were released Saturday after lawsuits by BuzzFeed News and CNN led to public access to hundreds of pages of documents from special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation. The documents included summaries of interviews with other figures from the Mueller probe, including Trump’s former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen. Information related to Ukraine took on renewed interest after calls for impeachment based on efforts by the president and his administration to pressure Ukraine to investigate Democrat Joe Biden. Trump, when speaking with Ukraine’s new president in July, asked about the DNC servers in the same phone call in which he pushed for an investigation into Biden. Manafort speculated about Ukraine’s responsibility as the campaign sought to capitalize on DNC email disclosures and as Trump associates discussed how they could get hold of the material themselves, deputy campaign chairman Rick Gates told investigators, according to a summary of one of his interviews. Gates said Manafort’s assertion that Ukraine might have done it echoed the position of Konstantin Kilimnik, a Manafort business associate who had also speculated that the hack could have been carried out by Russian operatives in Ukraine. U.S. authorities have assessed that Kilimnik, who was also charged in Mueller’s investigation, has ties to Russian intelligence. American intelligence agencies have determined that Russia was behind the hack, and Mueller’s team indicted 12 Russian agents in connection with the intrusion. Gates also said the campaign believed that Michael Flynn, who later became Trump’s first national security adviser, would be in the best position to obtain Hillary Clinton’s missing emails because of his Russia connections. Flynn said he could use his intelligence sources to obtain the emails and was “adamant that Russians did not carry out the hack” because he believed that the U.S. intelligence community couldn’t have figured out the source, according to the agent’s notes. Flynn later pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his contacts with the Russian ambassador. Mueller’s investigation concluded in March with a report that found insufficient evidence to establish a criminal conspiracy between Russia and the Trump campaign to sway the 2016 presidential election. The report also examined multiple episodes in which Trump sought to seize control of the Russia probe but did not conclude one way or the other about whether the president had illegally obstructed justice. Attorney General William Barr ultimately concluded that the president had not committed a crime. Gates worked with Manafort in a lucrative international political consulting business that included Ukraine and later testified against him. Gates pleaded guilty last year in Mueller’s investigation and has been one of the government’s key cooperators. He has yet to be sentenced as he continues working with investigators. Manafort was sentenced to more than seven years in prison, in part for financial crimes arising from his Ukraine work. During his interviews with investigators, Gates said that Donald Trump Jr. would ask where the hacked emails were during family meetings in the summer of 2016. Gates recalled that other key campaign aides, including future Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner and Flynn, also “expressed interest in obtaining the emails as well,” according to an agent’s written summary of one interview. The identity of one of the people who expressed interest in the emails is blanked out. One time on the campaign aircraft, Gates told the FBI, candidate Trump said “get the emails.” Gates also said that another point, Trump told him that more leaks were coming, though the heavily redacted documents do not indicate how Trump knew that. Gates also described conversations with the chairman of the Republican National Committee, Reince Priebus, who later entered the White House as the first chief of staff. Gates described the RNC as energized by the emails and said that though Trump and Kushner were initially skeptical about cooperating with the RNC, “the WikiLeaks issue was a turning point,” the FBI notes show. WikiLeaks was the website that published the stolen emails in the weeks before the election. The campaign was also very pleased by the releases, though Trump was advised not to react to it but rather to let it all play out, according to the interview summaries. The RNC would put out press releases to amplify the emails’ release, Gates told the FBI. “The RNC also indicated they knew the timing of the upcoming releases,” though Gates didn’t specify who at the RNC had that information. “Gates said the only non-public information the RNC had was related to the timing of the releases.” Manafort, meanwhile, was trying to advise the Trump campaign even after severing ties with the campaign, causing alarm among some of the candidate’s most senior advisers. Manafort emailed Kushner, on Nov. 5, 2016, just days before the election, saying he was feeling good about the prospect of a Trump presidency. In the email, Manafort said he was “focusing on preserving the victory” and that he had sent a memo to Priebus and had briefed Gates and Fox News host Sean Hannity, a close Trump ally. Kushner sent Manafort’s email to Trump adviser Steve Bannon, who replied: “we need to avoid this guy like the plague.” “They are going to try and say the Russians worked with wiki leaks to give this victory to us,” Bannon wrote to Kushner and David Bossie, another Trump associate, in his reply. “Paul is nice guy but can’t let word get out he is advising us.” https://nypost.com/2019/11/02/mueller-documents-manafort-pushed-ukraine-hack-theory/
THE MUELLER MEMOS The Mueller Report’s Secret Memos BuzzFeed News sued the US government to see all the work that Mueller’s team kept secret. We have published the first installment, with revelations about the Ukraine conspiracy theory, Michael Cohen, Paul Manafort, and more. Paul Manafort was pushing the unfounded conspiracy theory — now part of the impeachment inquiry into President Donald Trump — that Ukraine hacked the Democratic National Committee's emails as early as 2016. The president’s former personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, "had to keep Trump out of the messaging related to Russia” in preparation for his testimony to Congress under oath and that the false testimony was "not his idea." Top Trump campaign aide Rick Gates said the campaign was “very happy” when a foreign government helped release the hacked DNC emails. These are some of the revelations that BuzzFeed News pried loose after pursuing five separate Freedom of Information Act lawsuits for all the subpoenas and search warrants that then–special counsel Robert Mueller’s team executed, as well as all the emails, memos, letters, talking points, legal opinions, and interview transcripts it generated. [Read the documents here.] In response to a court order, the Justice Department released the first installment of documents: hundreds of pages of summaries of FBI interviews with witnesses, available here for the first time. Another installment will be released every month for at least the next eight years. [Make more work like this possible: Become a BuzzFeed News member today.] The documents revealed Saturday, known as “302 reports,” are summaries of interviews with former White House official and Trump campaign manager Stephen Bannon, Cohen, Gates, and more. They are some of the most important and highly sought-after documents from Mueller’s investigation. They reveal what key players in the campaign told FBI agents about Russia, Trump, the email hack during the 2016 presidential campaign, and Trump's associates’ handling of the special counsel’s investigation. Mueller’s 448-page report last March was the most hotly anticipated prosecutorial document in a generation, laying out the evidence of Russia's interference in the 2016 election and the Trump administration’s efforts to obstruct the inquiry. The report, however, reflected only a small fraction of the billions of primary-source documents that the government claims Mueller’s team may have amassed over the course of its two-year investigation. [We want your help! If you see something in these memos, you can email reporter Jason Leopold at jason.leopold@buzzfeed.com or reach us securely at tips.buzzfeed.com.] Those documents are a crucial national legacy, a key to understanding this important chapter in American history. But the public has not been allowed to see any of them. Until now. After years of speculation and accusation, these documents offer a chance for everyone to view a key function of American democracy. That opportunity — hard-won, but enshrined anew with each additional FOIA release — commences today. It will last long after all the players have departed. Some takeaways from the memos: Manafort was pushing the conspiracy theory that Ukraine hacked the DNC as early as 2016 In an April 2018 interview with the special counsel’s office, Rick Gates, who had served as deputy Trump campaign chair and had long been Paul Manafort’s right hand, told investigators that after the campaign learned the DNC had been hacked, Manafort pushed the theory that Ukraine, not Russia, had orchestrated the attack. It’s a conspiracy theory that’s persisted in right-wing circles, even after the US Intelligence Community concluded Russia was involved, and one that Trump brought up in his July 2019 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. In a written memorandum of the July call released by the White House, Trump at one point says to Zelensky, “I would like you to find out what happened with this whole situation with Ukraine, they say CrowdStrike… I guess you have one of your wealthy people… The server, they say Ukraine has it.” Read more on this. Relevant document on page 14: FBI Michael Cohen "had to keep Trump out of the messaging related to Russia" The documents reveal how Cohen, Trump's former personal lawyer who spent years in his inner circle, worked through how to talk about issues related to Trump and Russia. In preparation for his testimony to Congress, "Cohen's message had several components," according to notes of his FBI interview. "COHEN has to keep TRUMP out of the messaging related to Russia and keep TRUMP out of the Russia conversation." He also told investigators that any false testimony was "not his idea." Cohen told Congress in February, “In his way, he was telling me to lie,” about concealing negotiations to build a Trump Tower in Moscow. Cohen pleaded guilty in 2018 to lying to Congress about when discussions related to the Trump Tower Moscow deal had ended. Relevant document on page 77: FBI Cohen also "learned the message to have the Russia investigations end early from discussions with TRUMP, SEKULOW" and a third person whose name is redacted. Relevant document on page 74: FBI Gates said the Trump campaign was "very happy" about the release of hacked DNC emails Gates, who served as Trump’s deputy campaign chair, told Mueller’s team in late 2018 that the release of the hacked emails “offered a mode of deflection for the campaign after a sink in polling numbers following Trump's comments about Ted Cruz's father at the end of the Republican National Convention.” WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said in June 2016 that the group had an upcoming email leak related to Hillary Clinton. After that, Manafort instructed Gates to “periodically call” someone whose name is redacted from the documents “to check in on where the information was and when it would be coming,” Gates told the FBI. “Trump was generally frustrated Clinton's missing emails had not been found,” Gates also told investigators. Read more and view the relevant documents. After the hacked DNC emails, Trump told Gates that "more leaks were coming" Shortly after the Democratic National Convention in 2016 — which came right after Russian hackers stole DNC emails, throwing the party into disarray — Trump and Gates, a top campaign aide, were riding in a car from Trump Tower in Manhattan to LaGuardia Airport. Trump told Gates that "more leaks were coming." When it came to the Trump campaign conspiring with Russia to influence the election, Mueller's report, released in April, found that no charges were warranted, but that there is still information he did not know. “While the investigation identified numerous links between individuals with ties to the Russian government and individuals associated with the Trump campaign,” Mueller wrote about a conspiracy with Russia, “the evidence was not sufficient to support criminal charges.” Relevant document on page 42: FBI Bannon told the FBI that Jared Kushner vacationed with a Russian oligarch Bannon told FBI investigators that Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner were on vacation in Croatia with a “Russian billionaire” in August 2016 — appearing to confirm a long-suspected and long-denied connection between Trump world and a Russian oligarch. Messages between Bannon and an unnamed individual with a Breitbart domain email address — exchanged in July 2017, one month before Bannon was fired from his position as White House chief strategist — revealed that they were hoping to leverage this information against Kushner. Bannon cofounded the far-right Breitbart and rejoined it in August 2017. The messages and information were documented as part of an interview with then–special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigators, and were revealed by BuzzFeed News for the first time Saturday. Representatives for Kushner and Ivanka Trump didn’t immediately return requests for comment. In a Feb. 14, 2018, interview with the special counsel’s office, Bannon said that Kushner had been on vacation with a Russian oligarch when he took over the Trump campaign in August 2016. In the documents released Saturday, Bannon told investigators that Kushner had been in Croatia with the unnamed Russian billionaire, Rupert Murdoch’s ex-wife Wendi Deng, and the Russian’s girlfriend, whom Bannon said his sources in the intelligence community found to be “questionable.” Relevant document on page 109: FBI Kushner and his family’s Croatian vacation in August 2016 was widely covered in the media. Throughout the trip, Deng was photographed with Kushner and his wife, Ivanka, who also shared a picture of herself and Deng in the country’s capital city on her Instagram account. Deng didn’t immediately return a request for comment. Bannon referenced Kushner’s vacation in an email dated July 24, 2017, to an individual with a Breitbart domain email address whose name has been redacted. Bannon appeared to indicate that the information, if reported and confirmed, could be valuable against Kushner, his rival for power in the Trump administration. “He was on ‘vacation’ off the coast of Croatia with a Russian billionaire when I took over the campaign,” Bannon wrote. “How do we prove that?” The unnamed person replied. “That’s game set match.” Relevant document on page 178: FBI The same day as these emails, Bannon exchanged messages with someone at Breitbart about a Guardian story reporting that Kushner secured a real estate deal with another Soviet-born oligarch. “Don’t touch yet,” Bannon said. “k this is big though isn’t it? It’s the ball game…” the Breitbart person responded. “All and everything,” Bannon replied. Relevant document on page 179: FBI Manafort was advising the Trump campaign up until days before the election Bannon’s emails show that Manafort was still advising the Trump campaign three days before the Nov. 8, 2016 election — despite having been fired in August — and said the campaign needed to hide that fact. Manafort emailed Kushner on Nov. 5 and wrote that he was “feeling really good about our prospects on Tuesday.” He said that he was focused “on preserving the victory” and had sent Kushner “a memo deal[ing] with this concern.” Manafort wrote that he had sent the memo to Reince Priebus, the former chair of the Republican National Committee and Trump's former chief of staff, and “briefed Rick Gates and Hannity.” Kushner forwarded the email to Bannon the same day and asked him what he thought. “We need to avoid this guy like the plague,” Bannon said in an email to Kushner dated Nov. 5. “Paul is nice guy but can’t let word get out he is advising us.” “They are going to try to say the Russians worked with wiki leaks to give this victory to us.” Relevant document on page 238: FBI Page 29, Rick Gates's 302: Gates said Trump's "Russia if you're listening" line was an "ad lib." He was referring to Trump's comment, "Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing," at a July 27, 2016, press conference in Florida. He was urging Russian hackers to work to find emails belonging to his opponent, Hillary Clinton. Gates also said that he recalled "staff meeting conversations about 'someone out there has to have the missing emails.'" Related document: FBI A Trump associate sent Bannon a bizarre debate tactic Trump supporter and associate Ted Malloch emailed Bannon before the first debate and said Trump should start by handing Hillary Clinton a "Writ of Indictment." Trump and his associates by that time had led "lock her up" chants at his rallies at the Republican National Convention. And he told Clinton during the second debate she'd "be in jail" if he became president over her email controversy. Relevant document on page 230: FBI Bannon on recognizing the Israeli capital as Jerusalem In December 2017 Trump formally recognized the contested city of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. The move broke with the long-standing international consensus to refrain from recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's capital until it brokered a peace agreement with the Palestinians. But Trump made it a major campaign pledge. After a Feb. 14, 2018, interview, the FBI wrote, "Bannon had been working on a proposal to move the Israeli capital to Jerusalem, the Christian right movement, putting money into a 501(c)(4) using UAE money or 'those guys' which didn't end up happening, and putting together a security conference over in the Middle East in the Spring/Summer of 2017. Relevant document on page 118: FBI This is just, well, lol "Bannon first met Trump in August of 2010. Their first meeting was approximately 2 hours long. David Bossie was present and said that Trump was thinking of running for president in 2012. Bannon said 'for what country?'" Relevant document on page 111: FBI Regarding Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting with a Russian lawyer at Trump Tower in 2016 The file for Cohen's FBI interview from August 2018 contained a few handwritten pages, with one note that read, "DJT Jr.: I have a meeting in order to get dirt on Clinton. (or, 'Hillary')." Relevant document on page 265: https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/jasonleopold/mueller-report-secret-memos-1
Man, you need to get off that fence, lol. When a trail of garbage keeps leading you to the same place there is a good chance the one it leads you to is the one littering.
I just dont think any of it really matters. Laws and all that stuff dont seem to apply. Im not surprised by any of it. So therefore I shrug because at this point I just dont think anythings ever going to actually happen. Maybe after he is taken out of office.
To me, the important part is to have all his indiscretions exposed so that people will wake up and realize how corrupt he is and if not fully impeached at least not voted back in. Another 4 years of this administration will lessen whatever credibility our country has left.
You can call it riding the fence if you want. I dont think our country has had any credibility for years. Im glad that stuff is coming forward, but I also dont think any of it is changing anyone’s mind at this point. The people who hate Trump just see it as more reasons to hate Trump, Trumps base see’s it as a witch hunt. You could argue if it is or not but thats how they see it. Unfortunately it seems like its become partisan garbage where the GOP is sticking up for this person... for god knows what reasons and the DNC has hated him all along. All the information is great but at the same time it just doesnt seem to be going anywhere or changing anyones mind. So again, I read that whole thing, NOTHING was surprising, nothing in theres gonna change anyones mind and its just another day of a corrupt country, a corrupt administration, and where my opinion doesnt mean a thing, in fact popular opinion doesnt mean a thing. Ive grown apathetic towards it at this point, I’ll vote in 2020 for a candidate that will most likely lost, but Im gonna keep working hard, keep doing my best to parent my kids, and try to be a good husband because thats what I can control.
There are still plenty of people "on the fence" and those are the ones that can make the difference of whether this guy goes forward for another 4 years or not. Sitting on the fence and just throwing your hands up and saying it won't make a difference are those that won't make a difference. I'm in this battle for my kids and grandkids. You should be in it for your kids.
Im not on the fence in regards to Trump or wanting him as my president though. I wasnt in 2016 either, didnt want him then either. Oregon will vote blue no matter what my “”vote is”, and Im ok with that. Im not leaving it up to the government to take care of my kids, I’ll do it myself.
Yeah usually the rich people just buy off the politicians, this time they cut out the middle men and became the politicians, who could've guessed that would go awry...
Every time I vote yes on a school budget, and I always do, I'm helping to take care of kids including yours if the live in Oregon and especially if the live in my district.
That's good, I think supporting education is great. I'm homeschooling my children, but education is extremely important.
