A company linked to Russian oligarchs and Russian President Vladimir Putin that reportedly hired President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen, had also registered websites aimed at white nationalists as well as alt-right groups during the 2016 presidential campaign.
According to The Washington Post, Columbus Nova registered several website domains and named them after the alt-right movement.
The movement started to drastically grow during the campaign, and it turns out its growth is attributed to the sites Alt-right.co, Alternate-right.com, Alternate-rt.com and Alt-rite.com, which were reportedly registered to the company.
Meanwhile, a spokesperson for Columbus Nova told the Post that the company was unaware of the sites before Wednesday, adding that chief executive Andrew Intrater was not acting on behalf of the firm when he registered the websites. Intrater used his company email address and listed the organization while creating the sites.
It is unclear what content the sites had since they are down now, but the Post added that they were registered just two days after Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton gave a speech in August 2016 denouncing the movement. NBC News was the first that reported the website registrations.
Special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigators have already questioned Intrater and Russian investment partner Viktor Vekselberg, an oligarch with ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin. NBC also reported that Intrater and Vekselberg are cousins.
The investment employed Cohen as a consultant, Michael Avenatti, Stormy Daniels’ attorney, reported on Tuesday. Avenatti said that the $500,000 in payments may have been used to reimburse Cohen’s $130,000 “hush money” payment to the adult-film star.
Trump, after a year of denying, admitted last week that he paid back his lawyer for the payment to Daniels days before the election as a way to keep her quiet about an alleged sexual encounter with Trump in 2006.
Be the first to comment