President Donald Trump on Sunday asked the authorities why Tony Podesta, the older brother of Hillary Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta and co-founder of the onetime lobbying powerhouse the Podesta Group, had not been “charged and arrested.”
“And why hasn’t the Podesta brother been charged and arrested, like others, after being forced to close down his very large and successful firm? Is it because he is a VERY well connected Democrat working in the Swamp of Washington, D.C.?” Trump tweeted.
Trump mentioned Podesta in one of his several tweets on Sunday, aimed at criticizing Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into alleged collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian officials.
In October last year it was made public that Mueller was probing the Podesta Group over its lobbying work on behalf of a nonprofit group called the European Centre for a Modern Ukraine (ECMU).
According to Mueller’s indictment of former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and associate Rick Gates, the Brussels-based ECMU functioned as a “mouthpiece” for Viktor Yanukovych, Ukrainian pro-Russian president between 2010 and 2014.
Fox News reported that Manafort and Gates enlisted the Podesta Group and one other firm to lobby on behalf of the ECMU, the “nominal client,” so that Manafort and Gates could continue their work on Yanukovych’s behalf without making the required legal disclosures to the Justice Department.
The indictment against Tony Podesta showed that the Podesta Group was not paid directly by the ECMU, but rather through offshore bank accounts controlled by Manafort and Gates.
The special counsel’s office said that Gates gave the Podesta Group false talking points as an attempt to cover his and Manafort’s tracks about their work for Yanukovych and ECMU. Gates pleaded guilty to the charges and now is working with Mueller in his case against Manafort.
Be the first to comment