New Maria Butina court filings just made the Trump-Russia scandal a whole lot uglier for the GOP

| 8:10 pm EDT July 18, 2018
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Russian operative Maria Butina was denied bail today, ensuring she’ll remain in jail as the legal process plays out against her; she’s pleaded not guilty. But while that was somewhat expected, as she’s a potential flight risk to Russia, the court filing in support of denying her bail makes some stunning new accusations about how she went about gathering intel for Russia – and it may be about to blow back on a whole lot of Republican Party politicians and operatives.

The court filings make two key allegations about Maria Butina. The first is that she was in regular contact with Russia’s FSB, meaning that she was allegedly acting as a Russian spy while interacting with various political figures in the United States. The second is that she’s alleged to have been in a sexual relationship with a Republican Party operative who was twice her age, even as she offered sex to other U.S. political operatives in exchange for political access – and she was apparently reporting all of this back to the Kremlin.

These new allegations arrive within the context of Butina having met publicly and privately with a very long list of U.S. political figures, including NRA leaders and prominent Republican office holders. Just because any given politician took a selfie with Butina, it doesn’t mean that anything salacious or treasonous took place between them. But now that the Feds are presenting evidence that Butina’s methods included offering sex in exchange for political favors, it stands to reason that we’re going to see some very ugly details come out about at least some of the Republican politicians she was interacting with.

What’s more, the Feds revealed this week that they raided Maria Butina’s home back in April, meaning they already have at least some of her emails, phone records, and other communications. They may not even need her to cut a plea deal in order to get to the Americans she was involved with. Keep in mind that she’s been charged with not just acting as a foreign agent, but also with conspiracy to act as a foreign agent, suggesting that Americans will be charged with conspiring with her.