Can Jeff Merkley Stop The GOP Drive To Confirm Kavanaugh?

Jeff Merkley-- doing something to stop it

I hate writing about Kavanaugh and I'm so glad Noah does every night at midnight. Instead I want to say something about one of my favorite U.S. senators, Jeff Merkley (D-OR). But first a couple of Kavanaugh quickies. I'm sure that everyone in the country now knows that Michael Avenatti's client is Julie Swetnick and that she was a former student at Gaithersburg High School who went to some of those wild high school parties with Kavanaugh and his crowd. She was a victim of gang rape at one of those parties. And, she's willing to testify that she witnessed Kavanaugh and Mark Judge getting teenage girls "inebriated and disoriented" so they could then be "gang raped" in a side room or bedroom by a "train" of numerous boys. "I have a firm recollection," said Swetnick, "of seeing boys lined up outside rooms at many of these parties waiting for their 'turn' with a girl inside the room. These boys included Mark Judge and Brett Kavanaugh.

Yesterday CNN reported that Señor Trumpanzee is dissatisfied with the race of the confirmation-- he called it a CON JOB (his emphasis) on twitter-- and wants to take over the operation himself. CNN: "It has led the President to believe that he must personally take charge of defending his embattled nominee ahead of Thursday’s critical appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Trump made the decision to hold a news conference on the eve of the hearing, making it the fourth he has held as president." He then sent out this tweet:

Avenatti isn't taking any of this lying down. "I’m going to caution Donald Trump, Brett Kavanaugh, Chuck Grassley and others: If they try to come after my client or engage in some smear campaign, they better pack a lunch, because we’re going to respond two-fold." Presumably their lunch buckets will be filled with bologna.

Dr. Christine Blasey Ford released her polygraph test just as a Marist poll for NPR came out showing that if Ford is telling the truth, 59% of Americans believe the Senate Judiciary Committee should not confirm his nomination. A Morning Consult poll for Politico is even worse. Even Republican women are skeptical about this guy getting onto the Supreme Court.

Remember how a few days ago Ted Lieu called on his colleagues on the House Judiciary Committee to open an investigation of Kavanaugh that could lead to him being impeached as a Circuit Court judge? Yesterday Jeff Merkley announced that he's "seeking an injunction in federal court designed to stop a final vote on Brett Kavanaugh, asserting an obstruction of his constitutional duty to advise and consent on nominees."

Merkley's bid for an injunction hinges on the Senate's constitutional duty to provide advice and consent on nominees and charges that he's been prevented from fulfilling that due to the withholding of records on Kavanaugh's past service in the George W. Bush administration.

“The events of the past ten days have only underscored how critical it is that the Senate conduct a careful and comprehensive review of a nominee before giving its consent,” Merkley told Politico in a statement.

“The unprecedented obstruction of the Senate’s advice and consent obligation is an assault on the separation of powers and a violation of the Constitution. The President and Mitch McConnell want to ram through this nomination come hell or high water, without real advice or informed consent by the Senate, but that’s just not how our Constitution works.”

Late yesterday the Pew Research Center released a poll showing that Kavanaugh's appointment is now a big deal driving Democratic enthusiasm for midterm voting. 72% of voters say the issue of which party controls Congress will be a factor in their vote. Democratic enthusiasm is at 67% and Republican enthusiasm is at 59%.

Opinions about Donald Trump also continue to be an important consideration for voters. A 60% majority views their midterm vote as an expression of opposition or support toward Trump-- with far more saying their midterm vote will be “against” Trump (37%) than “for” him (23%).

First, Democrats hold a 10-percentage point lead over the Republicans in the generic ballot. About half of registered voters (52%) say if the election were today, they would vote for the Democrat in their district or lean toward the Democratic candidate; 42% say they would support the Republican or lean Republican. In June, the Democrats’ lead in the generic ballot was five percentage points (48% Democratic, 43% Republican).

Second, while voter enthusiasm is relatively high among voters in both parties, it is somewhat higher among voters who favor the Democratic over the Republican candidate. Overall, 61% of all registered voters say they are more enthusiastic about voting than in past congressional elections, higher than at any point during midterms in the past two decades, including at later points in those elections.

Two-thirds of Democratic voters (67%) say they are more enthusiastic than usual about voting, compared with 59% of Republican voters. The share of Democratic voters who express greater enthusiasm about voting is substantially higher than at comparable points in three prior midterms, while enthusiasm among GOP voters is slightly higher than in September 2014 (52%) and about the same level as in October 2010 (57%).

Third, more Americans view the Democratic Party than the Republican Party as more concerned with people’s needs, more honest and ethical and more willing to work with leaders from the other party...

In terms of issues, the Democratic Party continues to hold a wide advantage over the Republican Party on dealing with health care (51% to 35%) and modest leads on foreign policy and immigration. While the two parties run about even on dealing with the economy (41% Democratic Party, 40% Republican Party), that represents a change since June, when the GOP held a significant, 9-point edge on handling the economy.

The survey, conducted amid allegations of sexual misconduct by Brett Kavanaugh, Trump’s nominee for the Supreme Court, finds that large majorities of voters in both parties view Supreme Court appointments as a “very important” voting issue.

Overall, 76% of registered voter-- including 81% who support the Democratic candidate and 72% who favor the Republican candidate-- say appointments to the court will be very important to their vote this fall. Among all voters, Supreme Court appointments rank with health care (75%) and the economy (74%) among the top voting issues.

No integrity by Chu Proser

While health care and the economy typically rank among the top issues for voters, there is no trend to past midterms on the importance of court appointments.

However, more voters view Supreme Court appointments as a very important issue today than did so in June 2016, during the presidential election. At that time, 65% of voters (70% of Republicans and 62% of Democrats) said court appointments were very important.

Grassroots Pushback Against Trump And His Congressional Enablers

Early yesterday morning, the Wall Street Journal ran a piece by Reid Epstein, GOP’s Tough Task in House Races: Reach Beyond Trump’s Base, pointing out that endangered Republicans must find supporters who will vote for them even though they disapprove of Señor Trumpanzee. "One of the biggest questions facing House Republicans seeking re-election in November is this: How popular is President Trump in their district? In every competitive congressional special election since Mr Trump was inaugurated, the Republican candidate won or lost by a margin that mirrored the gap between the president's approval and disapproval ratings in the district or state at the time. DCCC chairman Ben Ray Luján was happy to remind them that "If you look at our battlefield, 55 districts, the president is underwater in every one of those 55 districts across America."

No normal Americans think he's doing a good job-- only he and his brainwashed imbecilic supporters-- about a third of the voting population-- do. The Republican operatives charged with keeping midterm losses to a minimum are already getting desperate. No one has ever seen such ugly, vicious campaign ads this early in the cycle. Paul Ryan's slimy corporately-funded SuperPAC is running TV and radio ads that are so negative and so filled with distortions and invective that it is obvious that they're made to just turn people, primarily independent voters, off from voting. In Iowa, for example, they hope to save the seats of 3 endangered Trump rubber-stamps-- Rod Blum, David Young and Steve King-- by ruthlessly exploiting the tragic murder of Mollie Tibbetts.

Yesterday, Rod Tibbetts turned the tables on them and burned their asses with an OpEd in the Des Moines Register: Don't distort her death to advance racist views. Republican racists ignored his requests to stop using his daughter's death to promote the vile, divisive, hate-filled agenda. He wrote that they have "chosen to callously distort and corrupt Mollie’s tragic death to advance a cause she vehemently opposed. I encourage the debate on immigration; there is great merit in its reasonable outcome. But do not appropriate Mollie’s soul in advancing views she believed were profoundly racist."

Please leave us out of your debate. Allow us to grieve in privacy and with dignity. At long last, show some decency. On behalf of my family and Mollie’s memory, I’m imploring you to stop.

Throughout this ordeal I’ve asked myself, “What would Mollie do?” As I write this, I am watching Sen. John McCain lie in state in the Capitol Rotunda and know that evil will succeed only if good people do nothing. Both Mollie and Senator McCain were good people. I know that both would stand up now and do something.

The person who is accused of taking Mollie’s life is no more a reflection of the Hispanic community as white supremacists are of all white people. To suggest otherwise is a lie. Justice in my America is blind. This person will receive a fair trial, as it should be. If convicted, he will face the consequences society has set. Beyond that, he deserves no more attention.

To the Hispanic community, my family stands with you and offers its heartfelt apology. That you’ve been beset by the circumstances of Mollie’s death is wrong. We treasure the contribution you bring to the American tapestry in all its color and melody. And yes, we love your food.

My stepdaughter, whom Mollie loved so dearly, is Latina. Her sons-- Mollie’s cherished nephews and my grandchildren-- are Latino. That means I am Hispanic. I am African. I am Asian. I am European. My blood runs from every corner of the Earth because I am American. As an American, I have one tenet: to respect every citizen of the world and actively engage in the ongoing pursuit to form a more perfect union.

Given that, to knowingly foment discord among races is a disgrace to our flag. It incites fear in innocent communities and lends legitimacy to the darkest, most hate-filled corners of the American soul. It is the opposite of leadership. It is the opposite of humanity. It is heartless. It is despicable. It is shameful.

We have the opportunity now to take heed of the lessons that Mollie, John McCain and Aretha Franklin taught-- humanity, fairness and courage. For most of the summer, the search for Mollie brought this nation together like no other pursuit. There was a common national will that did transcend opinion, race, gender and geography. Let’s not lose sight of that miracle. Let’s not lose sight of Mollie.

Instead, let’s turn against racism in all its ugly manifestations both subtle and overt. Let’s turn toward each other with all the compassion we gave Mollie. Let’s listen, not shout. Let’s build bridges, not walls. Let’s celebrate our diversity rather than argue over our differences. I can tell you, when you’ve lost your best friend, differences are petty and meaningless.

My family remains eternally grateful to all those who adopted Mollie so completely and showered us with so much care, compassion and generosity. Please accept our desire to remain private as we share our loss. We love Mollie with all our hearts and miss her terribly. We need time.

This is the inevitable outgrowth of hateful shallow misanthropes electing one of their own-- with help from America's arch-enemy-- to the presidency. We have to fight back. I'm not thrilled, for example, with 2 of the 3 Democrats running for those Iowa seats. The only one I feel is truly worth voting for is J.D. Scholten, Steve King's opponent. But the hell with purism in 2018. Trump is too much of an existential threat to our nation, our democracy, our families to worry about Democrats not quite good enough. We need to elect Abby Finkenauer and Cindy Axne as much as we have to elect J.D. Scholten. Trump and his enablers are going to destroy what Americans have been fighting for since the Boston Teas Party in 1773 and the battles at Lexington and Concord in 1775.

It was very gratifying yesterday to see at Axios that David Hogg, one of the leaders of the students responding to the Parkland massacre, has a tangible plan to make a real difference. What he's doing should be a model for grassroots action across the country. He's using Trump's truthful and sensible tweet against Ted Cruz in the Texas Senate election, by putting it on billboards all over the state.

David Hogg, a Parkland school shooting survivor and founder of the activist group Never Again MSD, has helped to raise close to $10,000 through GoFundMe to pin a 2016 tweet from President Trump attacking Sen. Ted Cruz on a billboard in Texas.

The big picture: The joint venture between Hogg and the liberal Mad Dog PAC highlights GoFundMe as one of the moment's hottest political fundraising tools. And it's a perfect example of Hogg's social media savvy, which he and other Parkland survivors have utilized to amplify their political message ahead of this fall's midterm elections.

Beto has his own campaign to win the Texas Senate seat, absolutely blowing up, money pouring in from all over Texas and all over the country. He and Cruz have each raised $23 million so far-- Beto's completely from individuals, primarily in small contributions. Most of Cruz's money comes from the very wealthy and from corporate support. His biggest contributor is Woodforest Financial Group, with loads of cash flowing his way from extreme right PACs and corporate entities like Lockheed Martin, Goldman Sachs, Quantum Energy Partners and the Wilks brothers (two religionist maniacs who only have one position: intense homophobia). As of the June 30 FEC reporting deadline Cruz had $9,299,365 on hand-- and Beto had $13,961,358. That's why Trump is rushing to Texas for one of his neo-Nazi rallies to raise him some money. You can contribute directly to Beto's campaign by clicking on the thermometer on the right.

Meanwhile, one of the many banes of Trump's increasingly miserable existence is planning a counter-rally in whichever city Trump holds his pro-Ted Cruz rally. Michael Avenatti isn't fooling around and playing nice with the would-be dictator and his rubber-stamps: "When they go low, I say, we hit harder."

Swamp Times A Billion: Michael Cohen + Nicholas Mastroianni, The Worst Of Long Island

Mastroianni

In 2016 DWT looked closely, over the months, at a vile character named Nicholas Mastroianni, a real crook. He was the biggest financier of Patrick Murphy's ill-fated campaign-- other than Murphy's own father-- for Senate. Mastroianni contributes hundreds of thousands of dollars to both parties, especially to the most corrupt politicians, Debbie Wasserman Schultz being one of his favorites-- as well as Charlie Crist, Chuck Schumer, Donald Trump... he always manages to find the worst of the worst. These corrupt politicians continued backing pay-for-play with him, even after Fortune exposed him in 2014 as a super-rich mini-Trump from Long Island with "a long history of legal problems, failed ventures, and unpaid debts-- which have continued even as his professional fortunes have turned sharply upward-- leaving a legacy of conflicts, judgments, and entanglements." And what did he want from all these corrupt politicians? EB-5 visa manipulations to make himself very, very rich.


It would be hard to find a figure who has risen faster in this burgeoning realm than Nicholas Mastroianni, II. In just four years, he has developed a lucrative role raising money for marquee projects such as Atlantic Yards, the giant Brooklyn development anchored by the Barclays Center, home of the NBA’s Nets. Forest City Ratner, which is developing Atlantic Yards, has also retained Mastroianni to raise EB-5 money for its renovation of the Nassau Coliseum, home of the NHL’s Islanders. Other Mastroianni clients include the developers of three large Manhattan projects: the Charles, a 31-story condominium tower on the Upper East Side where the penthouse reportedly sold for $38 million; Bryant Park, a 32-story midtown Manhattan building with a luxury hotel and condos developed by HFZ Capital Group; and 855 Avenue of the Americas, a 41-story mixed-use edifice being developed by the Durst Organization.


All told, Mastroianni’s website boasts of involvement with $5.5 billion in development projects over the years, funded with $1.4 billion in EB-5 money, resulting in “40,000 jobs created.” Those are massive sums given that the entire EB-5 system raised a total of about $1.8 billion last year. Forest City Ratner CEO MaryAnne Gilmartin calls Mastroianni the"'go-to' leader in the field of EB-5 funding."

His career was all about Patrick Murphy and his father, Donald Trump, Chuck Schumer, Debbie Wasserman Schultz... everyone with no sense of ethics who could help his endeavors. And Thursday the Wall Street Journal connected Mastroianni to-- no surprise to anyone paying attention lately-- Michael Cohen and Kushner-in-law. The Journal reported that Mastroianni paid Washington's sleaziest law firm and lobbyist outfit, Squire Patton Boggs $370,000 to lobby Congress and the Trump Regime on EB-5 matters. Cohen was paid $500,000 a year to bring clients to Squire Patton Boggs. The Miami Herald chastised me in 2016 for breaking this news then.



Now, in the national examination of what kind of a creep Michael Cohen has always been, let's move away from Mastroianni and Patrick Murphy (currently floating trial balloons about a run for governor of Florida as the No Labels candidate) and take a look at what Pam and Russ Martens have found for Wall Street on Parade, First Republic: Meet the Bank at the Center of the Michael Cohen Scandal. Trump and Cohen both do banking with First Republic, which caters almost exclusively to the super-wealthy.

According to Avenatti, $500,000 that came into Cohen’s First Republic Bank account is tied to the Russian oligarch, Viktor Vekselberg, now on a U.S. sanctions list and closely tied to Russian president Vladimir Putin. The $500,000 came from a U.S.-based company, Columbus Nova, which has denied any corporate ties to Vekselberg. However, those clever folks at Think Progress, used the Wayback machine to access the Columbus Nova website as of January of 2017 where Columbus Nova is listed as a subsidiary of Renova Group, Vekselberg’s Russian company.

The people and businesses who have direct or indirect connections to Cohen’s account at First Republic are starting to mount up. They include AT&T, which has confirmed paying Cohen $600,000 for advice, and the giant Swiss pharmaceutical company, Novartis, which has admitted to transmitting $1.2 million to the Cohen account in order to seek “insights” on Trump. Both AT&T and Novartis confirmed to the New York Times that they had been contacted last November “by investigators for the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III….” According to a report by CNN yesterday, also questioned by Mueller’s team was Vekselberg-- the Russian oligarch tied to the $500,000 that found itself in Michael Cohen’s Essential Consultants LLC account at First Republic Bank.

Another connecting dot is Trump’s longtime personal friend, Tom Barrack, who served as Chair of Trump’s Inaugural Committee. According to the Associated Press, Barrack has also been interviewed by Mueller’s investigators. Barrack is the Founder of Colony Capital, LLC, now known as ColonyNorthstar, where he continues to serve as Executive Chairman. Barrack served on the Board of Directors of First Republic Bank from 2001 through 2007 and from 2010 to the present. The bank was previously owned by Merrill Lynch, which was absorbed into Bank of America during the financial crash in 2008. In 2010, Barrack’s Colony Capital was part of a buyout team that included General Atlantic LLC which put up “$1.86 billion in new equity capital” to purchase the bank according to a press release issued by First Republic Bank. On November 29, 2010, the bank sold shares to the public in an Initial Public Offering.

According to First Republic Bank’s 2018 annual proxy statement, Barrack owns 12,335 shares in the company. At this morning’s opening price of $97.06, that’s about $1.2 million – not a particularly large amount of money for a man that Forbes estimated to be worth $1 billion in 2013.

According to the Washington Post, “It was Barrack who persuaded Trump to hire political operative Paul Manafort-- whom Barrack first met in Beirut 40 years ago-- for the presidential campaign.” Manafort has been indicted by a grand jury convened in the Mueller probe.

Yesterday, it was widely reported that the U.S. Treasury’s Inspector General has opened an investigation into the leak of financial documents from First Republic Bank. Stormy Daniels’ attorney, Avenatti, has released information that would seem to have only come from Customer Account Cards inside the bank or documents seized in the raid on Cohen by the FBI in the Southern District of New York or from the Mueller investigation.

In a document released by Avenatti on his Twitter page, precise details from the Customer Account Card for Essential Consultants LLC at First Republic Bank appears to have been provided to him. Avenatti writes:

“In connection with the establishment of that account, Mr. Cohen was required to make certain representations to First Republic regarding Essential’s business as part of First Republic’s Know Your Customer (‘KYC’) anti-money laundering protocol.

“In order to establish the account, Mr. Cohen subsequently submitted information claiming, among other things, the following:

(a) Essential is a real estate consulting company that collects fees for investment consulting work;
(b) The company’s typical clients are U.S.-based high net worth individuals;
(c) The company’s primary source of funds will be derived from within the U.S. or a U.S.-based company;
(d) The company expected one (1) to twenty (20) incoming domestic only wires totaling $1,000 to $10,000 each month for consulting fees, and one (1) to twenty (20) ACH credits and electronic transfers totaling $1,000 to $10,000 each month;
(e) No outgoing wire transfers and debits related to ACH or electronic transfers were expected; and
(f) Receipts of the business would be internally transferred to Mr. Cohen’s personal account at First Republic Bank.

According to the Wall Street Journal, First Republic Bank filed a Suspicious Activity Report (SAR) with the U.S. Treasury’s FinCen unit on the Cohen account. Avenatti has said at least three SARs have been filed with FinCen related to this matter. In early April, Avenatti wrote to U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin requesting that the SARs information be released to the public, citing numerous legal case precedents for doing so. Thus far, Mnuchin has not supplied the information.

So where did all this illicit money sloshing around between Cohen, Trump, various Mafias and corporate America wind up-- and who got what? This morning Robert Cruickshank of Demand Progress reminded us that the $600,000 that AT&T funneled to Trump through Cohen's phony shell consulting firm went "to influence Trump’s position on regulatory issues at the FCC-- including net neutrality." The U.S. Senate is scheduled to vote-- in just a few days-- on whether to overrule Trump's crooked FCC and save net neutrality. Perhaps we'll get a hint about who else got some of this illicit dough by watching which sleaze-bag senators vote against it. Jack Shafer this morning: Giuliani insists that Senor Trumpanzee had no idea Cohen was raking in influence bucks. Really? "Money always leaves a trail. Dirty money leaves a trail of slime that taints everybody it touches. One unanswered question this week is whether all the consultative moolah coursing through Cohen’s LLC and moving through his 'shadowy business empire' of real estate, New York City and Chicago taxi medallion holdings, and assorted investment is on the up and up. If proved dirty, will they contaminate his boss, Trump, who traditionally loves using other people’s money? And, if Cohen has committed the money crimes that some suspect of him, will special counsel Robert S. Mueller III convince him to flip on his one-time boss and testify against him? Mueller has already demonstrated his interest in the slosh of Cohen cash and deal-making on behalf of the Trump Organization to Georgia, Kazakhstan and Russia."

Follow The Rubles

I bet Señor Trumpanzee is sorry he ever hired Stormy Daniels to go to bed with him. Funny the porn star has a lawyer better than Trump's whole legal team! Unlike Trumpanzee, Michael Avenatti actually did go to and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania. Avenatti also graduated first in his class from George Washington University Law School where he worked with Jonathan Turley and got every award available. Michael Cohen, for example got his law degree from Thomas M. Cooley Law School , one of America's schlockiest law schools, fighting to hold onto its accreditation, one of ten American law schools found to be out of compliance with the American Bar Association's requirement that schools only admit students who appear capable of earning a J.D. degree and passing the bar examination. As you know, Señor Trumpanzee only hires the best people. And... everyone know there was no collusion, no collusion... NO COLLUSION. Except there was. Putin put Trump into the White House. Trump is an illegitimate "president." He should be impeached immediately. This is one of the most shameful episodes in American history.

CNN made it into an exclusive yesterday. The exclusive-- which is news everywhere-- was that Mueller's investigators have questioned Viktor Vekselberg, a Russian oligarch, a sanctioned Putin puppet and multibillionaire who is one of the half dozen richest men in Russia, about hundreds of thousands of dollars in payments his company's U.S. affiliate made to Michael Cohen, immediately after the election. "The purpose of the payments," CNN naively reported, "which predate the sanctions, and the nature of the business relationship between Vekselberg and Cohen is unclear."

The scrutiny of the payments could add to the legal troubles for Cohen, whose home and office were raided last month as part of a criminal investigation by federal prosecutors in Manhattan. In court documents, the prosecutors said at least part of their inquiry stemmed from a referral from Mueller's office.

The questions asked of Vekselberg suggest that Mueller investigators have been examining some of Cohen's business relationships as part of the investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election. Vekselberg is one of two Russian oligarchs the FBI stopped earlier this year after their private jets landed in New York-area airports as part of Mueller's investigation.

Investigators also asked Vekselberg about donations the head of his US affiliate made to Trump's inaugural fund and campaign funds, sources said.

The attorney for Stormy Daniels-- the porn star who received $130,000 to keep quiet about an alleged affair she had with Trump a decade ago-- produced information Tuesday evening that appears to add further details to CNN's reporting. Michael Avenatti alleged that Cohen received half a million dollars from a company affiliated with Vekselberg in the months after the presidential election.

Avenatti alleged the $500,000 went into the bank account for Essential Consultants, a shell company that Cohen set up before the election that was used to pay Daniels. Avenatti added that the payments occurred from January to August 2017.

...Vekselberg's cousin Intrater gave generously to support Trump.

He donated $250,000 to the Trump inauguration fund, $35,000 to the Trump Victory Fund, and $29,600 to the Republican National Committee in June 2017, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

While it is illegal for foreigners to donate to US politics, Intrater is American.

However, the donations were a sharp increase from previous cycles and may raise questions for investigators. Intrater's only previous political donations included $1,200 to Democrat Bill Richardson's presidential run in 2008 and $2,600 in 2014 for Republican Chris Day's congressional race in New York. Renova Group donated between $50,000 and $100,000 to the Clinton Foundation, but it's not clear when the contribution occurred, according to the foundation's public list of donors.

Vekselberg may also be of interest to investigators because of his close ties to the Kremlin. He built his fortune following the collapse of the Soviet Union through a series of deals in the oil and gas sector. In 2004, he paid over $100 million to buy nine Faberge eggs from the American Forbes family, returning the second-largest collection of imperial eggs to Russia. Six years later, he was appointed by then-Russian president Dmitry Medvedev to lead the Skolkovo Innovation Center project, the Kremlin's answer to Silicon Valley.

From 2007 until March 2012, Vekselberg was a shareholder and chairman of the board of Rusal, the aluminum company controlled by Oleg Deripaska. Deripaska has business ties to former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, who has been indicted on fraud and tax related charges as part of Mueller's investigation. Manafort has pleaded not guilty. Deripaska, who also was added to the US sanctions list last month, has sued Manafort over a soured investment deal.

Lamesa Investments Ltd, an affiliate of Renova, acquired a large stake in the Bank of Cyprus at the same time Wilbur Ross, then a private equity investor, made a capital infusion into the then-struggling bank. Lamesa now holds a 9.2% stake in the Bank of Cyprus. Ross resigned from his position as vice chairman of the bank after he was confirmed as Trump's commerce secretary.

Vekselberg also attended the December 2015 dinner in Moscow for RT, the state-controlled television channel, where Michael Flynn, Trump's former national security adviser, sat beside Putin, according to NBC News. Flynn has pleaded guilty to lying about a call he had with the Russian ambassador during the presidential transition and is cooperating with the Mueller investigation.

Vekselberg attended Trump's inauguration ceremony as a guest of "one of his closest American business partners," Renova spokesman Andrey Shtorkh told the Washington Post. The New York Times reported that Intrater gave Vekselberg the ticket.

So why is the CNN reported so tepid and tentative? Maybe it was because Trump was carrying on again about "fake news" and taking away the White House credentials of news organizations that don't report the White House party line.

This afternoon, New York published a piece by Frank Rich, Following the Money in Trumpland Leads Ugly Places that may even shut up Giuliani and the orange ape he works for. Rich starts with the question the whole country is asking: "With Michael Avenatti’s revelation that the shell company Michael Cohen used for the Stormy Daniels payoff also received money tied to Russian oligarch Viktor Vekselberg (as well as payments from other companies with government business), it looks like the two main threads of Donald Trump’s legal troubles may be part of the same story. Has Avenatti found the 'collusion' that Trump has spent so much energy denying?" and he starts the process of answering it: "Avenatti, whose revelations have since been verified by the Times and others, is doing exactly what Woodward and Bernstein did in Watergate-- following the money. By doing so he has unveiled an example of collusion so flagrant that it made Trump and Rudy Giuliani suddenly go mute: a Putin crony’s cash turns out to be an essential component of the racketeering scheme used to silence Stormy Daniels and thus clear Trump’s path to the White House in the final stretch of the 2016 election. Like the Nixon campaign slush fund that Woodward and Bernstein uncovered, this money trail also implicates corporate players hoping to curry favor with a corrupt president. Back then it was the telecommunications giant ITT, then fending off antitrust suits from the government, that got caught red-handed; this time it’s AT&T. Both the Nixon and Trump slush funds were initially set up to illegally manipulate an American presidential election, hush money included. But the Watergate burglars’ dirty tricks, criminal as they were, were homegrown. Even Nixon would have drawn the line at colluding with Russians-- or, in those days, the Soviets-- to sabotage the Democrats."

And don't forget Rachel Maddow. Last night her analysis was far more courageous than CNN's "exclusive" reporting. A slight addition though: it turns out AT&T's bribe wasn't a measly $200,000 but a bribe more befitting Sr. Trumpanzee: $600,000. And late this afternoon Novartis admitted it gave Cohen a million buckaroos, not a mere $400,000.