RUSSIA/РОССИЯ THREAD—ASSANGE CHRGD W/ SPYING—DJT IMPEACHED TWICE-US TREASURY SANCTS KILIMNIK AS RUSSIAN AGNT
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He's been under audit for 5 years 
Uh oh 
This dude claimed to have inside info on the role Saudis and the Emiratis to get President Trump elected in 2016:
Andy Khawaja arrested | Spectator USA
Andy Khawaja arrested | Spectator USA
Cockburn
What does the financier know and what evidence does he have?
Andy Khawaja in a photo from his Instagram
From Lithuania comes news of the arrest of Ahmad ‘Andy’ Khawaja — dedicated party goer, ‘billionaire’ and Spectator ‘whistleblower’. Khawaja is being held in Lithuania pending extradition on charges of making illegal campaign contributions of $3.5 million in 2016. He and his lawyer accuse the US authorities of trying to silence him before the US presidential election, essentially for telling the story published in The Spectator’s March US edition. Back then, he denied doing anything illegal and claimed there was a cover up of something much bigger: hundreds of millions of dollars paid illegally by the Saudis and the Emiratis to get President Trump elected.
His lawyer in Lithuania, Vilija Viesunaite, told local journalists: ‘The arrest was made exactly two months before the US presidential elections and the detention period was also just the same two months…I would not rule out the possibility that several unusual factors had an impact on these decisions.’ When Khawaja spoke to The Spectator earlier this year, he claimed that the Department of Justice and the White House were trying to destroy him. He said they had already gone after his business, a payment processing company called Allied Wallet. ‘One day I might have to testify against them, so why not burn me first?’ The criminal charges of campaign finance violations were more of the same, he said. ‘The law has been manipulated. I see my case like a judgment time — when they brought Jesus Christ to the Romans. They just threw an accusation at him to crucify him. That’s how I see myself, Jesus Christ standing in a Roman court, being accused of things I never did.’
Khawaja gave $3.5 million to help elect Hillary in 2016. (Then he gave $1 million to Trump’s inauguration.) Prosecutors say the $3.5 million came from the Emiratis, hoping to buy influence. Khawaja says it was his money. In the Spectator story he says that — far more importantly — he gave a middleman for the Saudis and the Emiratis the technology to make huge campaign contributions disguised as millions of micropayments from ordinary Americans. He claimed that most of the money was used to elect President Trump. The Trump campaign and everyone else involved denied these allegations. Nevertheless, Khawaja says that his silence is vitally important to those in charge in Washington. If his case does get to court, it’s quite possible that the story he gave to The Spectator will form part of his defense. The question is — does he have the evidence to back it up?
abcnews.go.com
Large US political donor in jail in Lithuania
ABC News
3 minutes
Police have disclosed that a dual American and Lebanese citizen charged in the U.S. with conspiring to conceal the source of more than $3.5 million in donations during the 2016 U.S. presidential election is in jail in Lithuania
VILNIUS, Lithuania -- A dual American and Lebanese citizen charged in the U.S. with conspiring to conceal the source of more than $3.5 million in donations during the 2016 U.S. presidential election is in jail in Lithuania, police disclosed Monday.
Police said Ahmad “Andy” Khawaja "performed multimillion-dollar transactions and was in possession of significant amounts of money” when arrested.
His detention on Sept. 3 on an international arrest warrant was kept secret, and police confirmed it only after Monday’s ruling by a court in the Lithuanian capital, Vilnius, that he should remain in jail pending extradition hearings.
”The arrest was made exactly two months before the U.S. presidential elections and the detention period was also just the same two months,“ Khawaja lawyer Vilija Viesunaite told the 15min.lt news portal.
"I would not rule out the possibility that several unusual factors had an impact on these decisions and my client‘s rights were violated,” she was quoted as saying.
Khawaja is in custody at the request of the U.S. pursuant to an indictment issued in 2019. A Justice Department spokesperson said the agency generally does not comment on extradition matters until the defendant is returned to the United States.
Khawaja made his fortune in online payment processing by providing a key conduit in e-commerce for “high risk” merchants by helping route customers’ credit card purchases to banks.
He is the owner of an online payments company Allied Wallet Inc., and has contributed at least $6 million to Democratic and Republican candidates and groups. The donations earned Khawaja access to Hillary Clinton during the 2016 presidential campaign and a post-election Oval Office visit with President Donald Trump, according to a 2018 Associated Press investigation.
Court documents made public in December 2019 indicate that the indictment charged that Khawaja had aided an unnamed female candidate. Federal donor records show Khawaja gave millions of dollars to Democratic candidates, including the main political action committee supporting Clinton’s campaign. He also donated $1 million to Trump’s inaugural fund.
He is married to a Lithuanian citizen and has property in the Baltic country.
@88m3 @ADevilYouKhow @wire28 @dtownreppin214
@dza @wire28 @BigMoneyGrip @Dameon Farrow @re'up @Blackfyre @NY's #1 Draft Pick @Skyfall @2Quik4UHoes
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This crazy woman called it 3 years ago 
Congrats idiots. You got played.
Intelligence Officials Urged Trump Spy Chief Not to Disclose Unverified Russian Claims About Clinton
Intelligence Officials Urged Trump Spy Chief Not to Disclose Unverified Russian Claims About Clinton
Officials at CIA, NSA, Office of Director of National Intelligence warned disclosure to Congress would give credibility to Kremlin-backed material
By and
Updated Sept. 30, 2020 7:57 pm ET
John Ratcliffe was a vocal supporter of President Trump before taking the spy-chief job earlier this year.
Photo: Gabriella Demczuk/Press Pool
WASHINGTON—President Trump’s spy chief ignored urgings from senior U.S. officials not to release information about Russian intelligence material containing unverified allegations about Hillary Clinton and the 2016 election, according to people familiar with the matter.
Officials at the Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency, as well as nonpolitical career personnel within the office of Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, feared that sharing the information with Congress would give credence to unsubstantiated Kremlin-backed material. They argued the claim was sourced to Russian intelligence services that interfered in the 2016 election to denigrate Mrs. Clinton, that year’s Democratic presidential nominee, and could have been deliberate disinformation, the people said.
A CIA spokesman referred reporters to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which Mr. Ratcliffe runs. The NSA declined to comment and referred questions to the same office, known as the ODNI.
“We don’t comment on internal [intelligence community] deliberations,” an ODNI spokeswoman said.
On Tuesday, Mr. Ratcliffe sent a letter to Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.), the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, that disclosed that Russian intelligence analysis obtained by U.S. spy agencies claimed that Mrs. Clinton, the 2016 Democratic nominee for president, had approved a campaign plan that year to tie then-candidate Donald Trump to Moscow’s hacking of Democratic emails. Mr. Graham then released the letter publicly.
“The [intelligence community] does not know the accuracy of this allegation or the extent to which the Russian intelligence analysis may reflect exaggeration or fabrication,” Mr. Ratcliffe said in the letter.
The Senate Intelligence Committee, on which Republicans have a majority, had already reviewed the Russians’ claim about Mrs. Clinton and deemed it to lack factual basis, according to people familiar with the matter. Politico earlier reported on the panel’s rejection of the Kremlin’s information.
Mr. Ratcliffe’s decision to release the material prompted criticism in interviews, on social media and in congressional testimony from Democratic lawmakers and former senior U.S. intelligence officials—many of whom have served both Republican and Democratic administrations—that Mr. Ratcliffe is using his position to help Mr. Trump’s re-election campaign.
“This is the most blatant act of politicization by a DNI that I have ever seen,” wrote Mike Morrell, a former senior CIA official under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, on Twitter.
Former FBI Director James Comey told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, “It contains within it a statement that it is unverified information, so I really don’t know what he’s doing.”
Nick Merrill, a spokesman for Mrs. Clinton, said the claim was “utter, baseless, bullshyt.”
Mr. Trump made a brief reference to the letter at Tuesday night’s presidential debate. “What happened today with Hillary Clinton, where it was a whole big con job,” Mr. Trump said.
Following the disclosure of his letter, Mr. Ratcliffe denied the Kremlin-sourced claims were Russian disinformation, and said they had “not been assessed as such by the intelligence community.”
Mr. Ratcliffe, a former Republican congressman, was a vocal supporter of Mr. Trump before taking the spy-chief job earlier this year. Democrats have accused him of abusing his position to try to help Mr. Trump in the November election, arguing Mr. Ratcliffe is seeking to wield intelligence—especially as it relates to Russian election interference—on behalf of Mr. Trump, who dismissed previous intelligence directors after clashing with them over the issue.
“Ratcliffe is even willing to rely on unverified Russian information to try to concoct a political scandal, a shocking abdication of his responsibilities to the country,” Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, a Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said.
The U.S. intelligence community has assessed that Russia has undertaken a broad effort to damage Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s bid for the presidency. The findings echo those from the intelligence agencies nearly four years ago that Russia intervened in the 2016 contest, at President Vladimir Putin’s direction, in part to boost Mr. Trump’s campaign and harm Mrs. Clinton. That conclusion was corroborated by former special counsel Robert Mueller and a bipartisan report by the Senate Intelligence Committee. Russia has denied the campaign.
In addition to the claim about Mrs. Clinton, the information disclosed by Mr. Ratcliffe said that then-CIA Director John Brennan briefed President Obama about the unverified Russian intelligence.
A former senior U.S. intelligence official said that Mr. Brennan briefed Mr. Obama on Moscow’s interference in the 2016 election and “conducted these briefings on Russia irrespective of which U.S. political party or candidate was referenced in the intelligence.”
Mr. Ratcliffe on Tuesday briefed Mr. Graham and senior staff members for Senate Intelligence Committee members on the intelligence, but staff for Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, and Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee, weren’t allowed in, according to people familiar with the matter. A spokeswoman for Mr. Graham said Republican Senate Judiciary staffers were also barred from participating.
Briefings were offered to a bipartisan group of senators and staff, the spokeswoman for Mr. Ratcliffe’s office said, adding that more briefings may be forthcoming and that offers had been made to the leadership of both intelligence committees.
Mr. Ratcliffe’s letter also said that on Sept. 7, 2016, U.S. intelligence officials forwarded an investigative referral to Mr. Comey, the then-FBI director, regarding the claims about Mrs. Clinton. Appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, Mr. Comey said that the episode “doesn’t ring any bells with me.”
Write to Dustin Volz at dustin.volz@wsj.com and Warren P. Strobel at Warren.Strobel@wsj.com
Intelligence Officials Urged Trump Spy Chief Not to Disclose Unverified Russian Claims About Clinton
Intelligence Officials Urged Trump Spy Chief Not to Disclose Unverified Russian Claims About Clinton
Officials at CIA, NSA, Office of Director of National Intelligence warned disclosure to Congress would give credibility to Kremlin-backed material
By and
Updated Sept. 30, 2020 7:57 pm ET
John Ratcliffe was a vocal supporter of President Trump before taking the spy-chief job earlier this year.
Photo: Gabriella Demczuk/Press Pool
WASHINGTON—President Trump’s spy chief ignored urgings from senior U.S. officials not to release information about Russian intelligence material containing unverified allegations about Hillary Clinton and the 2016 election, according to people familiar with the matter.
Officials at the Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency, as well as nonpolitical career personnel within the office of Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, feared that sharing the information with Congress would give credence to unsubstantiated Kremlin-backed material. They argued the claim was sourced to Russian intelligence services that interfered in the 2016 election to denigrate Mrs. Clinton, that year’s Democratic presidential nominee, and could have been deliberate disinformation, the people said.
A CIA spokesman referred reporters to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which Mr. Ratcliffe runs. The NSA declined to comment and referred questions to the same office, known as the ODNI.
“We don’t comment on internal [intelligence community] deliberations,” an ODNI spokeswoman said.
On Tuesday, Mr. Ratcliffe sent a letter to Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.), the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, that disclosed that Russian intelligence analysis obtained by U.S. spy agencies claimed that Mrs. Clinton, the 2016 Democratic nominee for president, had approved a campaign plan that year to tie then-candidate Donald Trump to Moscow’s hacking of Democratic emails. Mr. Graham then released the letter publicly.
“The [intelligence community] does not know the accuracy of this allegation or the extent to which the Russian intelligence analysis may reflect exaggeration or fabrication,” Mr. Ratcliffe said in the letter.
The Senate Intelligence Committee, on which Republicans have a majority, had already reviewed the Russians’ claim about Mrs. Clinton and deemed it to lack factual basis, according to people familiar with the matter. Politico earlier reported on the panel’s rejection of the Kremlin’s information.
Mr. Ratcliffe’s decision to release the material prompted criticism in interviews, on social media and in congressional testimony from Democratic lawmakers and former senior U.S. intelligence officials—many of whom have served both Republican and Democratic administrations—that Mr. Ratcliffe is using his position to help Mr. Trump’s re-election campaign.
“This is the most blatant act of politicization by a DNI that I have ever seen,” wrote Mike Morrell, a former senior CIA official under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, on Twitter.
Former FBI Director James Comey told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, “It contains within it a statement that it is unverified information, so I really don’t know what he’s doing.”
Nick Merrill, a spokesman for Mrs. Clinton, said the claim was “utter, baseless, bullshyt.”
Mr. Trump made a brief reference to the letter at Tuesday night’s presidential debate. “What happened today with Hillary Clinton, where it was a whole big con job,” Mr. Trump said.
Following the disclosure of his letter, Mr. Ratcliffe denied the Kremlin-sourced claims were Russian disinformation, and said they had “not been assessed as such by the intelligence community.”
Mr. Ratcliffe, a former Republican congressman, was a vocal supporter of Mr. Trump before taking the spy-chief job earlier this year. Democrats have accused him of abusing his position to try to help Mr. Trump in the November election, arguing Mr. Ratcliffe is seeking to wield intelligence—especially as it relates to Russian election interference—on behalf of Mr. Trump, who dismissed previous intelligence directors after clashing with them over the issue.
“Ratcliffe is even willing to rely on unverified Russian information to try to concoct a political scandal, a shocking abdication of his responsibilities to the country,” Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, a Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said.
The U.S. intelligence community has assessed that Russia has undertaken a broad effort to damage Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s bid for the presidency. The findings echo those from the intelligence agencies nearly four years ago that Russia intervened in the 2016 contest, at President Vladimir Putin’s direction, in part to boost Mr. Trump’s campaign and harm Mrs. Clinton. That conclusion was corroborated by former special counsel Robert Mueller and a bipartisan report by the Senate Intelligence Committee. Russia has denied the campaign.
In addition to the claim about Mrs. Clinton, the information disclosed by Mr. Ratcliffe said that then-CIA Director John Brennan briefed President Obama about the unverified Russian intelligence.
A former senior U.S. intelligence official said that Mr. Brennan briefed Mr. Obama on Moscow’s interference in the 2016 election and “conducted these briefings on Russia irrespective of which U.S. political party or candidate was referenced in the intelligence.”
Mr. Ratcliffe on Tuesday briefed Mr. Graham and senior staff members for Senate Intelligence Committee members on the intelligence, but staff for Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, and Democrats on the House Intelligence Committee, weren’t allowed in, according to people familiar with the matter. A spokeswoman for Mr. Graham said Republican Senate Judiciary staffers were also barred from participating.
Briefings were offered to a bipartisan group of senators and staff, the spokeswoman for Mr. Ratcliffe’s office said, adding that more briefings may be forthcoming and that offers had been made to the leadership of both intelligence committees.
Mr. Ratcliffe’s letter also said that on Sept. 7, 2016, U.S. intelligence officials forwarded an investigative referral to Mr. Comey, the then-FBI director, regarding the claims about Mrs. Clinton. Appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday, Mr. Comey said that the episode “doesn’t ring any bells with me.”
Write to Dustin Volz at dustin.volz@wsj.com and Warren P. Strobel at Warren.Strobel@wsj.com
