It’s becoming increasingly clear that the Stormy Daniels scandal isn’t just about infidelity—it’s about the Trump administration’s rampant corruption. (1/15)
Yesterday, Daniels’s lawyer posted pictures of Michael Cohen and Michael Flynn apparently meeting with a former Qatari diplomat named Ahmed al-Rumaihi in Trump Tower during the transition. (2/15)
We also learned last week that al-Rumaihi, who now runs the Qatari government’s sovereign-investment fund (QIA), has apparently been trying to bribe his way to a meeting with Steve Bannon. (3/15) thefader.com/2018/05/10/ice…
In the process, al-Rumaihi allegedly bragged about how many Washington politicians have taken his money—including Flynn. (4/15) documentcloud.org/documents/4456…
There’s a lot to untangle, but there are three important threads: (5/15)
1. Michael Flynn. We know he was on foreign governments’ payrolls before the election and pushed for a nuclear-energy plan in the Middle East—including while he was National Security Adviser. (6/15) themoscowproject.org/explainers/sey…
He was also apparently in the business of taking meetings about sketchy foreign policy proposals, like the one with Cohen and Sater about a peace plan for Crimea from a pro-Kremlin Ukrainian politician. (7/15) nytimes.com/2017/02/19/us/…
It’s not a stretch to believe that, during his three weeks on the job, Flynn may have secretly taken money from Qatar as well—and if he was, it’s likely that Mueller already knows. (8/15)
2. Jared Kushner. His floundering real-estate company has been desperately searching for foreign investors to bail it out. (9/15) bloomberg.com/graphics/2017-…
In the process, his father, Charles Kushner, made a direct pitch to Qatar’s Minister of Finance in April 2017. (10/15) theintercept.com/2018/03/02/jar…
Al-Rumaihi’s visit could’ve been part of those negotiations—which ultimately broke down shortly before Kushner endorsed Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries’ blockade against Qatar. (11/15) theintercept.com/2018/03/02/jar…
3. The Steele dossier. In December 2016, Russia sold off 19.5 percent of the state-owned gas company Rosneft. According to the dossier, that was the Kremlin’s way of paying off its American co-conspirators. (12/15) themoscowproject.org/dossier/
Where did the 19.5 percent go? Right now, it’s in the hands of QIA. (13/15) reuters.com/article/us-ros…
If Steele is right, the meeting may have been about that payoff—which would be a big step toward confirming Steele’s account of how collusion occurred. (14/15) themoscowproject.org/dossier/
We don’t know all the details about what Flynn, Cohen, and al-Rumaihi were doing in Trump Tower. But given what we already know, it’s hard to find an explanation that doesn’t point back to the Trump administration’s unprecedented corruption. (15/15) corruptipedia.org
