It's clear Cohen lied to the press about his dealings with Artemenko—so one wonders who else he lied about this to. Sater was involved in the deal also—and as a federal asset we should assume Mueller has the truth from him. This begins to close the circle. politico.com/story/2018/05/…
2/ Cohen's lies about Artemenko include whether he opened Artemenko's package—he says he didn't but says he knows how many pieces of paper were in it—whether he passed it along, and whether he knew who Artemenko was. Cohen lied because he knew what he was doing might be illegal.
3/ Cohen was supposed to give the deal to Flynn, which confirms that Flynn was seen by Putin as Trump's guy on Russia issues—with Cohen being the plausibly deniable front-end fixer because he wasn't in the administration and theoretically had attorney-client privilege with Trump.
4/ The Artemenko "peace" deal—which was simply a sanctions deal from the Kremlin that was obscenely favorable to Russia—was an attempt to collect on Trump's Mayflower Hotel promise of a "good deal" for Russia on sanctions at a time Trump knew Russia had waged cyberwar on America.
5/ The deal was an illegal continuation of—and fruit of—the illegal sanctions negotiations Flynn had had with Russia during the transition, which itself were the product of Flynn and Kushner's December 1, 2016 meeting with Kislyak to establish a clandestine back-channel to Putin.
6/ Don't forget that that December 1, 2016 meeting was itself the product of a November call from Kushner to Kislyak (Reuters) and several other calls or meetings involving Flynn (NYT) in November. So the Artmenko "peace" deal was the culmination of months of secret negotiations.
7/ But we also know Kislyak talked sanctions with Sessions in September and July 2016—and quite possibly at the VIP hour preceding Trump's Mayflower speech in April 2016 (when Trump promised Russia a "good deal"). So we should see the sanctions negotiations as a year-long secret.
8/ We know Trump planned to start his presidency with a sanctions deal for Putin—and Artemenko looks to have been the courier for that deal. As it was a deal Trump negotiated even as Putin was at war with America in cyberspace, Artemenko becomes a key figure in Trump's treachery.
