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The Robert Mueller Investigation

Hugo Stiglitz

By Hugo Stiglitz
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Goredho
Goredho

Just to make sure I have the alternative facts straight...  Our government -- but I'm guessing only the deep state part of it --- is now guilty of torturing a poor, naive Russian exchange student who

Incredulity
Incredulity

liberals suddenly being terrified of Russia and manic for election integrity is just pure comedy gold.

Chooky
Chooky

I don't believe for a moment that any of this is entertaining to you.  I think it gives you a bit of anxiety knowing that your best weapon against a group who you despise is a bumbling fraud as a busi

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bolverk

bolverk 29,399

Posted
Posted
7 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

LOL.  Anything new there relevant to the context of this thread...

Go ahead and click through the link pissant. 

 

That's a pretty lame attempt at a "gotcha" when read in the full context of the preceding sentences. 

Quote

The returns are some of the most sought-after, and speculated-about, records in recent memory. In Mr. Trump’s nearly four years in office — and across his endlessly hyped decades in the public eye — journalists, prosecutors, opposition politicians and conspiracists have, with limited success, sought to excavate the enigmas of his finances. By their very nature, the filings will leave many questions unanswered, many questioners unfulfilled. They comprise information that Mr. Trump has disclosed to the I.R.S., not the findings of an independent financial examination. They report that Mr. Trump owns hundreds of millions of dollars in valuable assets, but they do not reveal his true wealth. Nor do they reveal any previously unreported connections to Russia.

Later in the story, the Times goes on to note:

Quote

No subject has provoked more intense speculation about Mr. Trump’s finances than his connection to Russia. While the tax records revealed no previously unknown financial connection — and, for the most part, lack the specificity required to do so — they did shed new light on the money behind the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow, a subject of enduring intrigue because of subsequent investigations into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.

That link on the lack of specificity goes to a ProPublica article from 2017 which stated that his personal tax returns would likely not uncover a direct connection:

Quote

 

In fact, searching for a Russian connection in Trump’s returns is a diversion from the real reasons the American public has a stake in seeing them.

We’ll get to those. But first, let’s see what the experts have to say.

“Tax forms don’t require much specificity,” said Steve Rosenthal, a senior fellow at the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center. Rosenthal, who has helped news organizations including The New York Times and The Washington Post parse Trump tax documents, says that, “You’re not going to see an entry that says, ‘Loan from Russian oligarch.’… Even if you borrowed money directly from the Russian government, you don’t have to say to whom you paid the interest.”

“Trump’s income is derived from the business entities — LLCs, corporations and partnerships — in which he owns interests,” says tax lawyer Bob Lord, an associate fellow with the Institute for Policy Studies who was an informal adviser on tax matters to Bernie Sanders’s campaign.

“It is possible, albeit unlikely, the tax returns of the business entities in which Trump owns an interest might reveal a relationship with Russia or a Russian oligarch,” Lord added. “Because Trump’s personal tax return will reflect only the income or loss flowing to Trump from those entities, his personal tax return would not be a reliable indicator of whether such a relationship exists.”

 

So, the enduring question remains, who lent him all that money? Given the totality of our knowledge, supported by a previous quote from his son stating to the effect that "we get all the money we need from Russia" in response to the family getting cut off from US banks, isn't it logical that the money did come them? 

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Texaspython

Texaspython 231

Posted
Posted
3 minutes ago, bolverk said:

That's a pretty lame attempt at a "gotcha" when read in the full context of the preceding sentences. 

Later in the story, the Times goes on to note:

That link on the lack of specificity goes to a ProPublica article from 2017 which stated that his personal tax returns would likely not uncover a direct connection:

So, the enduring question remains, who lent him all that money? Given the totality of our knowledge, supported by a previous quote from his son stating to the effect that "we get all the money we need from Russia" in response to the family getting cut off from US banks, isn't it logical that the money did come them? 

Look, it’s not on the tax return. Case closed

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zork

zork 629

Posted
Posted (edited)

so 400+ million owed but backed by how much?  what LTV %? He owns a ton of property, reportedly.

 

edit:

he reportedly invested 250 million upgrading the 150 million purchase of trump doral by itself.  not to mention the the other properties he owns or is in partnership

trump doral

Edited by zork
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Anastasis

Anastasis 23,394

Posted
Posted
4 minutes ago, bolverk said:

That's a pretty lame attempt at a "gotcha" when read in the full context of the preceding sentences. 

Later in the story, the Times goes on to note:

That link on the lack of specificity goes to a ProPublica article from 2017 which stated that his personal tax returns would likely not uncover a direct connection:

So, the enduring question remains, who lent him all that money? Given the totality of our knowledge, supported by a previous quote from his son stating to the effect that "we get all the money we need from Russia" in response to the family getting cut off from US banks, isn't it logical that the money did come them? 

You too Bolverk?

Missing the point completely regarding the media coverage and framing....

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GW Hayduke

GW Hayduke 1,952

Posted
Posted
27 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

LOL.  Anything new there relevant to the context of this thread...

Go ahead and click through the link pissant. 

 

Hahahahahha

Imagine thinking that the absence of country of origin identified throughout a tax returns is proof positive that Russia or other nefarious lenders do not have trump under their thumb.

Did Brad Parscale give you this tip yesterday during his day drinking?

hahahahaja 

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Anastasis

Anastasis 23,394

Posted
Posted
2 minutes ago, GW Hayduke said:

Hahahahahha

Imagine thinking that the absence of country of origin identified throughout a tax returns is proof positive that Russia or other nefarious lenders do not have trump under their thumb.

Did Brad Parscale give you this tip yesterday during his day drinking?

hahahahaja 

Another dipshit that misses the point entirely. 

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Biff Tannen

Biff Tannen 45,492

Posted
Posted

I’m honestly not sure why we give Ana any room to breathe at this point. He’s literally the only person on this board constantly going against the Mueller report. He is obviously fairly intelligent, but it’s like 100-1. Just brush him off and move on. Even if he’s not a troll it’s one guy that keeps shifting the goal posts to fit his deep state or “the intelligence community can’t be trusted on anything” narrative. It’s dumb. 

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Anastasis

Anastasis 23,394

Posted
Posted
1 minute ago, Biff Tannen said:

I’m honestly not sure why we give Ana any room to breathe at this point. He’s literally the only person on this board constantly going against the Mueller report. He is obviously fairly intelligent, but it’s like 100-1. Just brush him off and move on. Even if he’s not a troll it’s one guy that keeps shifting the goal posts to fit his deep state or “the intelligence community can’t be trusted on anything” narrative. It’s dumb. 

What am I going against exactly that was proved up in the Mueller report?  My positions have been pretty out there as this played out over the years. And my batting average on the very specific details has been pretty good.  Better than yours. I do find it funny though that you charge me with shifting the goal posts. I mean, it's not like the goal posts are documented in this thread and searchable.   

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bolverk

bolverk 29,399

Posted
Posted
6 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

You too Bolverk?

Missing the point completely regarding the media coverage and framing....

No, I read through that slew of tweets with quotes from Dems that the tax returns themselves would reveal the Russia connection. I jumped in here quick on this, because it's been posted before by people smarter than me that the tax returns wouldn't reveal shit about to whom he owes money. So, when I read the big article last night, those sections I posted above were no surprise.

I'm worried about how our president became so highly indebted and to whom he owes the payback. What the NYTimes story does confirms is that Trump is in debt up to his eyeballs. That's to put it in the words of Susan Collins "concerning" because of the potential for being compromised, and every piece of public evidence we have indicates that the most likely source would be from oligarchs in the post-Soviet realm.

If there's a different narrative or framing that the media is missing on the source of all that cash, please enlighten me.

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Anastasis

Anastasis 23,394

Posted
Posted
3 minutes ago, bolverk said:

No, I read through that slew of tweets with quotes from Dems that the tax returns themselves would reveal the Russia connection. I jumped in here quick on this, because it's been posted before by people smarter than me that the tax returns wouldn't reveal shit about to whom he owes money. So, when I read the big article last night, those sections I posted above were no surprise.

Right.  It was always nonsense to believe otherwise. Now perhaps we self reflect on how that was engaged by this board?

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Texaspython

Texaspython 231

Posted
Posted
3 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

Right.  It was always nonsense to believe otherwise. Now perhaps we self reflect on how that was engaged by this board?

You seem to think the connections drawn by politicians were sincere. Could it be, maybe, they were trying to use any means to force him to release tax returns to confirm some things smart people have known all along:

1. Trump is a bad businessman

2. tax cheat

3. He’s not as rich as he makes himself seem.

So, it’s more likely you just don’t understand. 

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bolverk

bolverk 29,399

Posted
Posted
16 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

Right.  It was always nonsense to believe otherwise. Now perhaps we self reflect on how that was engaged by this board?

I'd really like to hear any theories you might have for the source of the loans. And, if you don't have any, what are you thoughts on him being $400 million in the hole whose notes are coming due soon? You do find that somewhat problematic, don't you?

You're probably a smarter man than I am, and you've likely given this some thought over the past 24 hours. What are you thoughts on all this debt, and to whom, as well as the implications? Let's move beyond the "gotcha" of what idiot politicians and posters inflamed in the moment have said. What is your honest assessment of this situation?

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Anastasis

Anastasis 23,394

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Posted
3 minutes ago, bolverk said:

You're probably a smarter man than I am, and you've likely given this some thought over the past 24 hours. What are you thoughts on all this debt, and to whom, as well as the implications? Let's move beyond the "gotcha" of what idiot politicians and posters inflamed in the moment have said. What is your honest assessment of this situation?

Don't do that condescend with me bolverk.  I don't think that I have ever condescended you in that way. If you go back 2 or 3 years, I told you that I would not be surprised one bit if investigations uncovered financial bullshit related to international real estate dealing, in fact I am fairly certain that I said that was a likely outcome. I also told yall that the trump campaign was too dysfunctional to pull off the international conspiracy nonsense some posters here were pimping while some here were huffing dossier delusions. Python still thinks that shit is in play, probably related to suddenly shaggy and his gimping of that nonsense. 

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bolverk

bolverk 29,399

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6 minutes ago, Anastasis said:

If you go back 2 or 3 years, I told you that I would not be surprised one bit if investigations uncovered financial bullshit related to international real estate dealing, in fact I am fairly certain that I said that was a likely outcome.

This, I didn't recall.

Quote

I also told yall that the trump campaign was too dysfunctional to pull off the international conspiracy nonsense some posters here were pimping while some here were huffing dossier delusions.

This, I did.

Not trying to condescend. Just trying to engage where ideas/theories can be discussed.

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bolverk

bolverk 29,399

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Posted

@Anastasis

Just finished up the latest article. I'm pretty sure you have a NYTimes subscription, but I thought I'd post concluding section that sheds a little light on the source of the money: himself?

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/09/28/us/donald-trump-taxes-apprentice.html

Quote

 

While Mr. Trump’s tax returns tell the story of how reality TV and its reflected glow made him rich, they also shed some light on an enduring question that has generated much head-scratching, if not dark speculation: Where did he get hundreds of millions of dollars to buy and prop up his golf resorts?

Mr. Trump had only two open golf courses and two more undergoing renovations at the time of his plunge into television, but golf — a pastime that he “spent an inordinate amount of time on,” his niece, Mary Trump, wrote in her recent family tell-all — always seemed destined to become his next financial sand trap.

“I have the best buildings in Manhattan. I have the best casinos in New Jersey. I build a great product,” Mr. Trump boasted to a reporter in 2002. “I actually have more fun building courses than I do playing.”

Beginning in 2006, and continuing over the next decade, he would accumulate 11 more golf courses, forming a new core of what he describes as his empire.

The amount of capital Mr. Trump has spent on his golf properties is staggering and has echoes of his earlier, ultimately disastrous, embrace of casinos. During a three-year period starting in 2014, he pumped $144.5 million into his Turnberry golf course in Scotland, his tax returns show, even as the property has continued booking losses year after year. He has put $213 million into his Doral resort in Florida, with similar results.

Meanwhile, Mr. Trump’s main source of income — “The Apprentice” and licensing deals — went into a steep decline starting in 2011, falling, along with the show’s ratings, from $51 million that year to $21 million by 2014, and eventually to less than $3 million in 2018.

Which is where those unsubstantiated theories of secret payments from Russia or the mob come in.

His tax records provide more mundane answers. They reveal that as he was pouring money into the golf resorts, he also pulled money out of other places in ways that suggested an immediate need. In 2012, he borrowed $100 million against his equity in Trump Tower in Manhattan, one of his more valuable properties. A year later, he withdrew $95.8 million from his share of a real estate partnership that owns buildings in New York and California. And in 2014, he sold $98 million in stocks and bonds.

These one-time maneuvers, coupled with the more than $427 million from “The Apprentice” and licensing deals, would probably have provided enough cash to cover his golf course investments. But they cannot be repeated, and in at least one case — the Trump Tower mortgage — they need to be paid back.

In addition, he has huge balances on loans, soon to come due, from Deutsche Bank, including $160 million on his Washington hotel in the Old Post Office building and $148 million on the Doral golf resort. Neither of those businesses is turning a profit.

In a series of tweets on Monday morning, a day after The Times published the first part of its investigation of his tax-return data, Mr. Trump sought to refute any negative impression of his wealth, insisting that he has “very little debt compared to the value of assets,” and suggesting that he might release statements “showing all properties, assets and debts.” It is unclear what sort of statements he was referring to; the public financial disclosures he must file as president already list his assets and debts.

As the president enters the final weeks of his re-election campaign trailing in virtually all the polls, he is a man politically and financially challenged.

Many of the old financial escape hatches have closed. After he announced his candidacy in 2015 with racist comments about Mexicans, NBC, which carried “The Apprentice,” cut ties with him and he sold his interest in the Miss Universe pageant, another reliable moneymaker. Hotel licensing deals have mostly dried up.

Last month, as he prepared for a Republican convention that would market him as America’s savior in this dark and disordered hour, Mr. Trump turned to two entertainment industry veterans with experience generating the kind of razzle-dazzle that had worked so well in the past.

Both had helped produce “The Apprentice.”

 

 

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Captainant

Captainant 27,448

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Posted

Judge orders DOJ to publish info redacted as privileged from Mueller report

Quote

District Judge Reggie Walton said the Trump administration had failed to justify certain redactions from the report on the special counsel's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.

The specific redactions he took issue with cover the decisionmaking process within former special counsel Robert Mueller's team over whether to charge certain people with crimes during the probe.

"Based on the Court’s review of the unredacted version of the Mueller Report, the Court concludes that the Department has failed to satisfy its burden to demonstrate that the withheld material is protected by the deliberative process privilege," Walton, who was appointed by former President George W. Bush, wrote in his 40-page opinion.

The decision comes as a result of a pair of lawsuits under the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) brought by a journalist with BuzzFeed News and the Electronic Privacy Information Center that sought to have the full, unredacted report released to the public.

Walton on Wednesday ruled that the DOJ could continue to withhold material it had redacted under FOIA exemptions allowing agencies to conceal information that would compromise law enforcement investigations or compromise the privacy of witnesses.

Matt Topic, who was lead attorney for plaintiffs, told The Hill: "After a very thorough review, the Court found that the Justice Department violated federal law with regard to a number of the redactions to the Mueller Report. We look forward to the release of this additional information by November 2."

A spokeswoman for the DOJ did not immediately respond when asked for comment.

In March, Walton ordered the DOJ to give him access to an unredacted copy of the report so that he could review their withholdings. He excoriated the department and Attorney General William Barr at the time for misrepresenting the report's conclusions before it was actually released.

"The inconsistencies between Attorney General Barr’s statements, made at a time when the public did not have access to the redacted version of the Mueller Report to assess the veracity of his statements, and portions of the redacted version of the Mueller Report that conflict with those statements cause the Court to seriously question whether Attorney General Barr made a calculated attempt to influence public discourse about the Mueller Report in favor of President Trump despite certain findings in the redacted version of the Mueller Report to the contrary," Walton wrote in March.

"These circumstances generally, and Attorney General Barr’s lack of candor specifically, call into question Attorney General Barr’s credibility" and the DOJ's arguments in the FOIA lawsuit, the judge added.

direct link to ruling

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