Why has Congress stalled on investigating money laundering allegations at Trump properties?

[turbinetree]

Stonewalled by investigators, interest in Trump's former projects in Panama and Azerbaijan seems to have disappeared.
Casey Michel
Apr 11, 2019, 8:00 am

When Donald Trump assumed the presidency in 2017, two of his foreign projects — one in Panama and one in Azerbaijan — stood out for what appeared to be clear links to foreign money laundering operations. But with Trump’s presidency enveloped in an unprecedented number of scandals, congressional willingness to investigate the properties appears to have wilted — in no small part because of stonewalling by the current administration.

Both properties were closely associated with Ivanka Trump. Trump described the Trump Ocean Club property in Panama City, Panama, as Ivanka’s “baby,” while the Trump Tower Baku project, located in Azerbaijan’s capital, was something Ivanka herself claimed she “oversaw.” Both endeavors, however, have been swamped in controversy — not simply because of signs pointing to money laundering operations, but because both projects have since imploded, with neither any longer carrying Trump’s name.

In Panama, for instance, the indicators of money laundering at Trump Ocean Club Panama, which the Trump Organization helped manage, were impossible to miss. From purchases in cash to bulk sales, from sales to anonymous shell companies to purchasers using “bearer shares” — in which the company is owned by whoever holds a physical stock certificate, without any registry keeping track of ownership — the signs were all there. One of the property’s primary sales brokers, Alexandre Ventura Nogueira, admitted in a 2013 conversation secretly taped by a former business partner that he was “regularly laundering money” across Panama.

And in Azerbaijan, the Trumps chose to partner with one of the most notoriously corrupt members of the country’s notoriously corrupt regime. For good measure, Trump’s Azeri partners contracted with an Iranian construction company that appears to have been a front for Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps.

https://thinkprogress.org/where-are-the-investigations-into-the-trump-properties-linked-to-foreign-money-laundering-705464010f8a/






Lock them UP............................

[real Cannabis calm]

1. Now, these serious crimes simply merge into the sea of higher profile Trump-scandals

[riversedge]

2. ..Both properties were closely associated with Ivanka Trump......I think many are afraid

to go near this mess. Just my opine.


......Both properties were closely associated with Ivanka Trump. Trump described the Trump Ocean Club property in Panama City, Panama, as Ivanka’s “baby,” while the Trump Tower Baku project, located in Azerbaijan’s capital, was something Ivanka herself claimed she “oversaw.” Both endeavors, however, have been swamped in controversy — not simply because of signs pointing to money laundering operations, but because both projects have since imploded, with neither any longer carrying Trump’s name.

[ProudMNDemocrat]

3. I would not put is past the SDNY and NY AG are looking into this....

and keeping quiet about it. Trump Org. is based out of New York. They have jurisdiction.

[stillcool]

4. so many crimes..

how do you choose?

In conversations with those familiar with the congressional questions surrounding the buildings, it’s clear that this aversion has less to do with evidence available and more to do with the fact that there are dozens of other areas of potential concern surrounding the president’s activities. After all, there are other Trump properties that, unlike those in Panama or Azerbaijan, are still connected directly to the president’s business. It also doesn’t help that there are statute-of-limitation concerns surrounding FCPA enforcement, which are generally kept to within five years.

[GemDigger]

5. The Azerbaijan mess was on MSNBC a couple of days ago.

It went with the story of Trump saying Iran is now on our shit list.

[triron]

6. Maxine Waters said she was getting cooperation from Deutshe Bank.