Kushner cleared of seeking Russian money to pay real estate - debt Posted: Apr 19th, 2019 - 6:04 am
he newly released Mueller report found no evidence that President Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner received Russian funding to cover a troubled New York City real estate loan, a press scandal that has dogged the top presidential advisor despite his denials.
Special counsel Robert Mueller’s report said that it looked into reports that Kushner sought funding to cover a pending $1.2 billion loan. But in the end, it said, “the investigation did not identify evidence.”
Outlets like the Washington Post had speculated that Kushner met with Russian officials after Trump’s election to solicit funds for his company’s loan for 666 Fifth Avenue. The Post wildly suggested that Kushner could face criminal charges.
Chief Political Correspondent Byron York on the expanded Washington Examiner magazine
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The new report however showed that Kushner didn’t have much knowledge of who he was meeting with and went into it as a courtesy, not to conduct business.
Mueller’s team focused on two meetings Kushner and his top aide Avi Berkowitz held with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak and with Sergey Gorkov, the head of a state-owned Russian development bank VEB.
In the first, it was the Russian embassy that sought a meeting with Kushner, which he declined.
In the second, he met with Gorkov on Dec. 13, 2016. VEB was the subject of Treasury sanctions.
The Mueller report indicated that Kushner did not have a keen interest in the meeting, however. “Kushner stated in an interview that he did not engage in any preparation for the meeting and that no one on the Transition Team even did a Google search for Gorkov’s name,” it said.
Gorkov, however, arrived with presents, a painting and “a bag of soil from the town in Belarus where Kushner’s family originated,” clearly hopeful for a good outcome for his firm.
Kushner called it “diplomatic” meeting and that Gorkov was interested in improving relations. It quoted Kushner saying that the two did not discuss Kushner’s business.
Mueller’s report, however, said that Gorkov claimed he met with Kushner in his capacity of CEO of Kushner companies “for the purpose of discussing business, rather than as part of a diplomatic effort.”
The report did not indicate why it believed Gorkov, subsequently fired from the firm the United States was punishing in sanctions related to Russia’s invasion of the Crimea.
“The investigation did not resolve the apparent conflict in the accounts,” said the report, adding, “Regardless, the investigation did not identify evidence that Kushner and Gorkov engaged in any substantive follow-up after the meeting.”
In fact, it revealed that Kushner and Berkowitz went out of their way to ignore any follow up with Gorkov.
LINK/URL: Kushner cleared of seeking Russian money to pay real estate
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