A TANGLED WEB

3 August, 2017

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher,

101 Main Street #380

Huntington Beach, CA 92648

Dear Congressman,

Re: A Tangled Web

“Oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practise to deceive!”  (You may have thought, as I did for many years, that the quote was from Shakespeare; but no, it’s apparently from Sir Walter Scott. No matter.) The tangled web I refer to here is your long-term relationship with Russia, about which I read again online today, in an article in the Los Angeles Times: “Why Rohrabacher’s Name Keeps Coming up in The Russia Investigation.”

There’s a chart in the article that shows your connections to such luminaries as Paul Manafort, Rinat Akhmetshin, Natalia Veselnitskaya, et al., in connection with efforts to overturn the Magnitsky Act, which imposed sanctions on Russian oligarchs and prevented their access to American banks. The mover and shaker behind that act was Bill Browder, whose explosive testimony shed much light on that infamous Trump Jr. meeting, purportedly to gather dirt on Hillary Clinton. It was in revenge for the Magnitsky Act that Putin issued his edict forbidding the adoption of Russian orphans by Americans—hence the pretense that the meeting had to do with “orphans.” What now seems apparent is that Putin, with the great wealth he has amassed through corruption and extortion, was personally affected by Magnistsky, and was determined to see it overturned. He thought the Trumps could help.

Clearly, he miscalculated. Congress has now effectively tied Trump’s hands with regard to the sanction, and rightly so. I wonder what position you now take. I recall another article, a while back, which described how the FBI was constrained to sit you down and warn you that you were in danger of being enlisted as a Russian spy! I hope you listened to the warning. But with the Russia scandal now threatening the presidency of your dear leader, I do wonder where you stand? Are you still, as earlier described, Putin’s best friend in the US Congress?

I myself believe, as I have said earlier, that Trump has for years been involved in laundering Russian money. I hope the Special Counsel will be able to tell us the whole truth.

Respectfully,

Peter Clothier, Ph.D.