FBI now investigating Donald Trump’s attorney Michael Cohen in Trump-Russia scandal
We’ve reached the point in the exploding Donald Trump Russia scandal where even Trump’s lawyer is now a suspect. Amid the revelation this week that Trump’s attorney Michael Cohen was involved in delivering a policy proposal from the Kremlin to Michael Flynn just before Flynn resigned, nearly lost in the clamor was the part about Cohen himself now being investigated by the FBI.
It’s still far less than clear why Michael Cohen was the one who delivered the policy proposal, which involved Trump using Russian blackmail material to oust the president of the Ukraine, so that his replacement could hand over Crimea to Russia. Nor is it clear what Cohen’s relationship is with Felix Sater, the criminally violent and Russian mafia-connected businessman who was also involved in delivering the policy proposal. But here’s a key passage in the New York Times article which exposed the conspiracy:
“Mr. Cohen is one of several Trump associates under scrutiny in an FBI counterintelligence examination of links with Russia, according to law enforcement officials; he has denied any illicit connections.” This confirms, for the first time, that the FBI is in fact investigating Michael Cohen. And the key word in that passage is “counterintelligence” – because it dovetails with a Reuters report which came out the same day and confirmed for the first time an FBI “counterintelligence inquiry” into front companies and middlemen being used as financial go-betweens between Russia and Trump and his (unnamed) associates.
This points to the possibility that Cohen is one of the “associates” in question, and that the FBI’s investigation into him is related to these front companies. Of course this isn’t the first time Cohen has been implicated in the Trump-Russia scandal. The infamous MI6 Russia dossier leaked in January claimed that Cohen had traveled to Prague to negotiate the terms of Russia’s blackmail over Trump. Cohen denies all of the above — but we’ve reached the point where even Trump’s lawyer is now being investigated as a suspect. Contribute to Palmer Report
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Bill Palmer is the publisher of the political news outlet Palmer Report