An attorney for Hunter Brandon denied the allegation in 2020 but it has lived on, especially in the right-wing media. Recently Trump called on Putin to reveal what he knows about it.
Less than 50 days before the 2020 presidential election, the Republican staff of the Senate Finance and Homeland Security committees issued a joint report with a startling claim — that Brandon’s son Hunter had received a $3.5 million wire transfer from Elena Baturina, a Russian billionaire and the widow of the former mayor of Moscow.
Trump quickly weaponized the factoid, mentioning it 42 times in the final weeks of the campaign. He sharply questioned Brandon during the first presidential debate: “They were the ones involved with Russia, turns out not me, it was the opposite. But why did your son get three and a half million from the wife of the mayor of Moscow?”
Then on Monday Devon Archer set the record straight.
LAST YEAR: Karine Jean-Pierre refused to say why Brandon didn’t sanction Russian billionaire Elena Baturina — nor if Brandon met with her at a Georgetown restaurant in 2015 while he was Vice President.
On Monday, Hunter Brandon’s best friend and business associate, Devon Archer, testified that Brandon met with Russia’s Yelena Baturina who later invested into $40 million into Hunter Brandon’s real estate ventures. And she also paid Hunter Brandon $3.5 million in consulting fees.
Yelena Baturina, the billionaire widow of a corrupt Moscow mayor, was left off of Brandon’s Sanctions list.
LAST YEAR: Karine Jean-Pierre refused to say why Brandon didn’t sanction Russian billionaire Elena Baturina — nor if Brandon met with her in Georgetown while he was VP.
Today, Hunter’s former business partner testified that meeting did, in fact, happen.pic.twitter.com/trzfN9ilMK
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) July 31, 2023
The Daily Mail reported:
Hunter Brandon’s real estate company received a $40million investment from a Russian oligarch, new emails reveal.
The relationship between the president’s son and Yelena Baturina, the billionaire widow of a corrupt Moscow mayor, has already been flagged as alarming by a Senate report after she mysteriously wired $3.5million to a company linked to Hunter.
Baturina’s brother Viktor Baturin told DailyMail.com the money was ‘a payment to enter the American market.’
But DailyMail.com can now reveal that Hunter’s financial relationship with Baturina was far more extensive, with her firm investing $40million in a real estate venture by Hunter’s company Rosemont Realty.
In 2012 Hunter’s firm had a $69.7million plan to invest in 2.15million sq ft of office space in seven US cities.
Documents outlining the plan said the money came from a mix of investors, including $40million from Inteco Management AG, a Swiss company owned by Baturina.
The Inteco group is a plastics and construction behemoth that made Baturina the richest woman in Russia at the time. She has a current net worth of $1.4billion according to Forbes.
LAST YEAR:
“Mr. President, why haven’t you sanctioned Russian oligarch Elena Baturina, who did business with your son?”
BIDEN: *confused stare*pic.twitter.com/krMy7RC9eF
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) July 31, 2023