Post
by bluetick » Thu Dec 13, 2018 12:46 pm
Maria Butina’s boyfriend claimed he set up Trump-Russia NRA “conduit” as campaign funds flowed - Republican operative Paul Erickson claimed in an email he’d set up a private Russia-GOP channel through the NRA
Igor Derysh
December 12, 2018 12:00pm (UTC)
Admitted Russian spy Maria Butina’s Republican operative boyfriend wrote in private communications that he was involved in setting up a “very private line of communication” between Russia and the Trump campaign using the National Rifle Association as a “conduit.”
Butina, a 30-year-old Russian gun rights activist, worked for years to cultivate relationships within Republican and NRA circles. She was charged with working as an agent of the Russian government earlier this year and on Monday agreed to plead guilty to conspiracy charges and cooperate with prosecutors.
In her plea deal, Butina admitted that she and “US Person 1,” who is longtime Republican operative Paul Erickson, “agreed and conspired, with a Russian government official,” whose description matches Russian banker and close Putin ally Alexander Torshin, for Butina to “act in the United States under the direction of Russian Official without prior notification to the Attorney General,” ABC News reported.
Under Torshin’s direction, the document said, Butina “sought to establish unofficial lines of communication with Americans having power and influence over U.S. politics.”
According to ABC News, federal prosecutors have notified Erickson, who had a romantic relationship with Butina, that he is now a target in the ongoing investigation.
..//..as these efforts were ongoing, the NRA was breaking spending records with sums of cash never before seen from the group.
The NRA, relying on an arm of the group that is not required to disclose its donors, spent more than $30 million to elect President Donald Trump, nearly triple the $12.5 million they spent to help republican nominee Mitt Romney in 2012. They spent $54 million in total to elect Republicans in 2016.
Since the 2016 election, the NRA has cut its spending drastically. During the 2018 midterm cycle, McClatchy reported that the NRA had spent just $1.6 million to help Republicans, about 10 percent of the $16 million the group had spent backing GOP candidates in the 2014 midterms.
"OMG, this is terrible. This is the end of my presidency. I AM FUCKED!"
