Some of the activities FBI agents gathered evidence about in 2009 and 2010 were covert and illegal.
A female Russian spy posing as an American accountant, for instance, used a false identity to burrow her way into the employ of a major Democratic donor in hopes of gaining intelligence on Hillary Clinton’s department, records show. The spy was arrested and deported as she moved closer to getting inside the secretary’s department, agents said.
Other activities were perfectly legal and sitting in plain view, such as when a subsidiary of Russia’s state-controlled nuclear energy company hired a Washington firm to lobby the Obama administration. At the time it was hired, the firm was providing hundreds of thousands of dollars a year in pro bono support to Bill Clinton’s global charitable initiative, and it legally helped the Russian company secure federal decisions that led to billions in new U.S. commercial nuclear business, records show.
Agents were surprised by the timing and size of a $500,000 check that a Kremlin-linked bank provided Bill Clinton with for a single speech in the summer of 2010. The payday came just weeks after Hillary Clinton helped arrange for American executives to travel to Moscow to support Putin’s efforts to build his own country’s version of Silicon Valley, agents said.
There is no evidence in any of the public records that the FBI believed that the Clintons or anyone close to them did anything illegal. But there’s definitive evidence the Russians were seeking their influence with a specific eye on the State Department.
Away from Bill Clinton’s check and the breaking news of a spy ring, the FBI had another major investigation underway where the Clinton name was surfacing.
Since 2009, the FBI had an undercover informant gathering evidence of a massive bribery and kickback scheme inside the Russian nuclear energy firm TENEX and its American arm TENAM.
http://thehill.com/policy/national-security/356630-fbi-watched-then-acted-as-russian-spy-moved-closer-to-hillary
Here are the seven facts about the Uranium One deal you need to know:
Peter Schweizer Broke the Uranium One ScandalGovernment Accountability Institute (GAI) President and Breitbart News Senior Editor-at-Large Peter Schweizer broke the Uranium One scandal in his book Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich. In the book, he reported that Clinton’s State Department, along with other federal agencies, approved the transfer of 20 percent of all U.S. uranium to Russia and that nine foreign investors in the deal gave $145 million to Hillary and Bill Clinton’s personal charity, the Clinton Foundation.
- The New York Times Confirmed the Scandal in 2015
The New York Times confirmed Schweizer’s Uranium One revelations in a 4,000-word front-page story by a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter. It detailed how the Russian energy giant Rosatom had taken over the Canadian firm with three separate purchases between 2009 and 2013, largely coinciding with Hillary Clinton’s time as secretary of state.
- The FBI Uncovered Evidence that Russian Money Was Funneled to the Clinton Foundation
The Hill reported last week that ahead of the deal, the FBI had uncovered “substantial evidence that Russian nuclear industry officials were engaged in bribery, kickbacks, extortion and money laundering” to expand Russia’s nuclear footprint in the U.S. as early as 2009. The agency also found that Russian nuclear officials had routed millions of dollars to the U.S. to benefit the Clinton Foundation. The Justice Department would sit on the evidence for four years before looking to prosecute, by which time the deal had been approved.
- Congress Is Now Investigating
The Senate Judiciary Committee has launched a probe into the scandal and has sent requests for more information to 10 federal agencies involved in the approval of the partial sale of Uranium One, asking what they knew about the FBI investigation and when.
- Bill Clinton Was Paid $500,000 for a Speech in Moscow
Bill Clinton bagged a $500,000 speech in Moscow paid for by a Kremlin-backed bank shortly after Russia announced its intention to take a majority stake in the company. According to the Times, Clinton traveled to Moscow in June 2010, the same month Rosatom struck its deal for its majority stake in Uranium One.
- The Clinton Foundation Took Big Bucks from Uranium Investors
According to theTimes, The Clinton Foundation received $2.35 million in donations from Ian Telfer, a mining investor who was also the chairman of Uranium One when Rosatom acquired it. It also received $31.3 million and a pledge for $100 million more from Frank Giustra, the Canadian mining financier whose company merged with Uranium One.
- Senate Republicans Want an FBI Gag Order Lifted
Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has called for the Justice Department to lift the gag order on the FBI’s whistleblower, indicating that he may have more explosive revelations related to the case and on what the Clintons and the Obama administration knew about the case and when they knew it.
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