Trump letter offers account of $100M in Russian money taken in since 2008

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump collected at least $100 million from Russian people or organizations between 2008 and this March, according to a personal letter from his tax counsels that he released Friday.

The amount could be higher. The letter notes that money from sales of condominiums or other products would “not have been separately identified as ‘Russian’ in your books.”

Also Friday, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein’s office confirmed that he “will come to brief the full Senate next week,” said Matt House, a spokesman for Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y. “The time and date are still being worked out.”

Trump released the letter, saying it had been sent to Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who had asked former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper in a recent Senate hearing if he had ever seen “a situation where a Trump business interest in Russia caused him concern.” Clapper’s answer appeared to be less than a wholesale no — he said he’d seen nothing to concern him in the investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 election but that he couldn’t answer beyond that because it could interfere with an investigation.

The letter, dated March 8, 2017, states: “With a few exceptions … your tax returns do not reflect any income of any type from Russian sources.”

It then goes on to define those exceptions. The first was “in 2013, the Miss Universe pageant was held in Moscow and of the $12.2 million of foreign income that it earned that year, a substantial portion of it was attributable to the Moscow event.”

The second exception stated that “in 2008, Trump Properties LLC sold an estate in Florida, that it had acquired in 2005 for approximately $41 million, to a Russian billionaire for $95 million.”

And the third explained “over the years, it is likely that TTO or third-party entities engaged in ordinary course sales of goods or services to Russians or Russian entities, such as sales, rental, fees for condominiums, hotel rooms, rounds of golf, books or Trump-licensed products (e.g. ties, mattresses, wine, etc.) that could have produced income attributable to Russian sources (such income would not have been separately identified as ‘Russian’ in your books and records and therefore not separately reflected on your tax returns). With respect to this last exception, the amounts are immaterial.”

The third exception appears to leave the question of Russia-related income unanswered. In 2008, Donald Trump Jr. claimed at a conference that “Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets,” when talking about who was buying property, such as condominiums. “We see a lot of money pouring in from Russia.”