WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday questioned the decision by the Trump administration Justice Department to settle a money-laundering forfeiture case with a Russian real estate investment firm that has ties to the Russian lawyer who met last year with President Donald Trump’s son.
Natalia Veselnitskaya represented the owner of Russian firm Prevezon Holdings Ltd. The letter sent by House Judiciary ranking member John Conyers and other Democrats asked Attorney General Jeff Sessions whether Veselnitskaya had been involved in settlement negotiations between the Russian firm and the Justice Department.
Prevezon agreed in May to pay $6 million to the government to avoid a civil trial on charges that the firm had laundered proceeds from an alleged $230 million Russian tax fraud scheme.
Veselnitskaya represented Dennis Katsyv, Prevezon’s owner. Katsyv backed a lobbying campaign in Congress and with federal officials last year that was aimed at scuttling the Magnitsky Act, a 2012 law that used sanctions to target officials and associates of Russian President Vladimir Putin and his government.
The House Democrats also asked why the Justice Department settled with Prevezon two days before trial and asked whether Trump, his family or other aides contacted the Justice Department about its case against Prevezon. The Democrats asked for copies of any messages showing such contacts.
Veselnitskaya met in June with Donald Trump Jr., who had agreed to the meeting after being promised damaging information about Hillary Clinton provided by the Russian government.
Wrong guy to ask. He’s never even heard of Russia before, to the best of his recollection.
how do you avoid political polarization? with a little Magnitsky.
This woman needs to be added to the sanctions under the Magnitsky Act as well. In fact if we can somehow rid ourselves of this Overripe Orange Julius the sanctions on Russia should be ratcheted up severely. So severely that their economy should be a desolate wasteland. Real talk.
I think that we might need a big one, given the “current” state of affairs.
Your Culture Break for today: Herewith some (roughly transcribed) lyrics from Patience, the best Gilbert & Sullivan work you’ve never heard of.
A magnet hung in a hardware shop,
And all around was a loving crop
Of scissors and needles, nails and knives,
Offering love for all their lives;
But for iron the magnet felt no whim,
Though he charmed iron, it charmed not him;
From needles and nails and knives he’d turn,
For he’d set his love on a silver churn!
His most aesthetic,
Very magnetic
Fancy took this turn:
If I can wheedle
A knife or a needle,
Why not a silver churn?
And iron and steel expressed surprise
The needles opened their well drilled eyes
The penknives felt shut up no doubt
And the scissors declared themselves cut out.
The kettles they boiled with rage 'tis said
And every nail went off its head
And hither and thither began to roam
'Til a hammer came up and drove them home
This most magnetic
Peripatetic lover he lived to learn
By no endeavor can a magnet ever
Attract a silver churn.