https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/3/6/17083720/trump-russia-news-nastya-rybka
"Leaving aside Vashukevich’s claims, which are currently very far from proven, there are still many questions about Paul Manafort and whether he tried to make contact with Oleg Deripaska while he was also chairing Donald Trump’s presidential campaign. (Manafort has since been indicted by special counsel Robert Mueller’s team, but not in relation to this.)
Deripaska was an old client of Manafort’s — in fact, the connected oligarch was one of Manafort’s first clients in what proved to be a very lucrative line of business in Russia and Eastern Europe. But things went awry between the two — they had a falling-out that ended in a lawsuit, with Deripaska claiming Manafort cheated him of millions.
So when the badly indebted Manafort got a high-profile job advising Trump’s presidential campaign in March 2016, Manafort saw an opportunity. He emailed his business associate Konstantin Kilimnik in early April about his newly high media profile, writing, “How do we use to get whole,” and “Has OVD operation seen?” (These are Deripaska’s initials.)
Then in July, Manafort and Kilimnik exchanged emails about Deripaska again, as the Washington Post and the Atlantic reported last year. “I am carefully optimistic on the issue of our biggest interest,” Kilimnik said. “He will be most likely looking for ways to reach out to you pretty soon.” Manafort wrote that if Deripaska “needs private briefings we can accommodate.”
The pair’s emails on the topic grew vaguer and more cryptic as the summer continued. In late July, Kilimnik wrote to Manafort, “I met today with the guy who gave you your biggest black caviar jar several years ago. We spent about 5 hours talking about his story, and I have several important messages from him to you.” This, again, is believed to be about Deripaska, with “caviar” thought to be code for money.
Kilimnik and Manafort arranged a meeting in New York City to discuss the matter on August 2 — Kilimnik wrote that he had a “long caviar story” to tell and “several important messages.” They have claimed this meeting was unrelated to the US presidential campaign. (Update: And according to flight records newly reviewed by Scott Stedman, a private jet owned by Deripaska flew in to Newark airport the very next day before departing the US that night. We don’t yet know if the oligarch himself was on it.)
Deripaska took the now-infamous yacht trip with Russia’s deputy prime minister a few days after this.
Manafort, unexpectedly, didn’t end up lasting much longer on the Trump campaign — he was fired on August 19. But there are still a great many questions about what, exactly, happened between him, Kilimnik, and Deripaska beforehand.
Furthermore, as Navalny points out, Vashukevich’s posts provide what had been a missing link in this particular collusion theory. Navalny says in his video that though Deripaska was viewed as close to Putin, many oligarchs are, and the theory always lacked any indication that “Deripaska transmits any information to him.”
Yet now we know that just days after Deripaska seems to have had a very important conversation with Manafort’s associate and sent important messages, Deripaska took a multi-day yacht trip with one of the highest-level officials in the Russian government, in which they discussed politics and the United States.
Special counsel Robert Mueller is surely very curious about the content of those discussions."
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