Holy Crap: Investigation Found Widespread Bribery and Kickbacks by Russia to Increase Their American Uranium Holdings During Obama Administration... While Hillary Was Approving Uranium Sale to Russia

Big, big story from Jonathan Solomon and Allison Spann.

FBI uncovered Russian bribery plot before Obama administration approved controversial nuclear deal with Moscow

BY JOHN SOLOMON AND ALISON SPANN

Before the Obama administration approved a controversial deal in 2010 giving Moscow control of a large swath of American uranium, the FBI had gathered substantial evidence that Russian nuclear industry officials were engaged in bribery, kickbacks, extortion and money laundering designed to grow Vladimir Putin’s atomic energy business inside the United States, according to government documents and interviews.

Federal agents used a confidential U.S. witness working inside the Russian nuclear industry to gather extensive financial records, make secret recordings and intercept emails as early as 2009 that showed Moscow had compromised an American uranium trucking firm with bribes and kickbacks in violation of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, FBI and court documents show.

They also obtained an eyewitness account -- backed by documents -- indicating Russian nuclear officials had routed millions of dollars to the U.S. designed to benefit former President Bill Clinton’s charitable foundation during the time Secretary of State Hillary Clinton served on a government body that provided a favorable decision to Moscow, sources told The Hill.

The racketeering scheme was conducted "with the consent of higher level officials" in Russia...

Rather than bring immediate charges in 2010, however, the Department of Justice (DOJ) continued investigating the matter for nearly four more years, essentially leaving the American public and Congress in the dark about Russian nuclear corruption on U.S. soil during a period when the Obama administration made two major decisions benefitting Putin’s commercial nuclear ambitions.

...

"The Russians were compromising American contractors in the nuclear industry with kickbacks and extortion threats, all of which raised legitimate national security concerns. And none of that evidence got aired before the Obama administration made those decisions," a person who worked on the case told The Hill, speaking on condition of anonymity for fear of retribution by U.S. or Russian officials.

It's worse than that, even -- it appears that Obama and Holder deliberately under-investigated and restricted the charges to as anodyne a list as possible so as not to alert the public (or even Congress) as to the full nature of the corruption.

posted by Ace at 12:22 PM

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