Trump faces the exit, pursued by Russian bear
President’s son could be charged after emails show contact with Moscow in hunt for dirt on Clinton
IT WAS a winter’s night in Moscow, yet as the sushi was served Donald Trump felt the warm glow of friendship, and the comforting thought of business deals to be done.
The restaurant, Nobu, had been shut that night in November 2013 by its franchise owner Aras Agalarov – a billionaire kindred spirit to Mr Trump, who, like his Manhattan friend, possessed an enviable property empire and wanted more.
The two men had brought the Miss Universe pageant, owned by Mr Trump, to Moscow, at a venue owned by Mr Agalarov. The two were also in talks to build a Trump Tower in Moscow, right next to the Agalarov tower.
Mr Agalarov invited his friends to the dinner – among them Herman Gref, chief executive officer of the state-controlled Sberbank PJSC, Russia’s biggest bank, and a man who was Mr Putin’s economy minister until 2007.
“The Russian market is attracted to me,” Mr Trump told a property magazine shortly after returning to the United States. “Almost all of the oligarchs were in the room.”
Now memories of that Moscow night are coming back to haunt Mr Trump.
Yesterday the President’s son, Donald Trump Jr, published a series of emails that had stated back in 2016 that Mr Agalarov had damaging information on Hillary Clinton, and he wanted to pass it on to his Manhattan friend.
The information “is part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr Trump”, wrote Rob Goldstone, a British music publicist and intermediary. Mr Goldstone, representing Mr Agalarov’s popstar son Emin, said that Emin wanted to get in touch with the Trumps to pass on the “incriminating” information.
America was left reeling by the evidence in the tweets posted by Mr Trump. He offered them up, “to be totally transparent”, alongside a statement that implied no wrongdoing.
Mr Trump Jr is now facing the possibility of criminal charges in what is the first evidence that the 2016 Trump for President campaign was open to using material provided by Russia to damage Mrs Clinton. Collusion is not a crime, but obtaining campaign “support” – including information – from a foreigner is.
As ever with the Trumps, they felt bluster and bravado would get them through. Mr Trump never signed the deal with Mr Agalarov; his presidential candidacy put paid to that, his son Emin Agalarov said.
The would-be president, while on the campaign trail, repeatedly insisted he had no business dealings in Russia – which is true – and little contact with anyone there, which is not so simple.
The Agalarovs remained in contact with Mr Trump after that 2013 Moscow trip. Emin performed at one of Mr Trump’s golf courses, persuaded the tycoon to make a cameo in one of his music videos, and visited Trump Tower.
When, according to Mr Goldstone’s emails, Aras Agalarov was told in June 2016 “by the crown prosecutor” – believed to be Yuri Chaika, the Russian prosecutor general – about possible incriminating material on Mrs Clinton, Mr Agalarov was keen to pass the information on to his Republican friend.
A meeting was brokered by Mr Goldstone with Mr Trump Jr and a woman who Mr Goldstone described as “the Russian government attorney”. On June 9, 2016, Natalia Veselnitskaya, a Russian lawyer, arrived at Trump Tower in New York. She claims she does not work for the Kremlin, and never had any information on Mrs Clinton. She thought the meeting was to discuss the Magnitsky Act – a US sanction list hated by Mr Putin.
Mr Trump Jr, however, went looking for “dirt”. He said none was provided, and almost appeared to believe a lack of compromising intelligence made the meeting acceptable. It will fall to Robert Mueller, who heads the Russia inquiry, to decide whether it was acceptable.
The publication of the emails surprised seasoned Trump watchers. James Stavridis, the former Nato supreme allied commander and current dean of The Fletcher School of law and diplomacy, said he was reminded of the Shakespearean stage direction in The Winter’s Tale: “Exit pursued by a bear.”
“And the Russian bear is just chasing Trump now,” he said.
An American journalist, Jared Yates Sexton, summed up the incredulity with which Mr Trump Jr’s emails were received. “I worked on this story for a year ... and ... he just ... he tweeted it out,” he said, adding: “Like it was nothing. Like, it was just another Tuesday.”
♦Russia will expel 30 US diplomats and seize diplomatic property if Mr Trump does not release two compounds seized by American authorities last year, its envoys have warned.
Sergey Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, said Moscow was outraged by the ongoing property dispute.