Hillary Clinton’s State Department may have let an American die — for no reason.
A Russian oligarch who featured prominently in Robert Mueller’s probe, Oleg Deripaska, told The Hill that he spent $20 million on an aborted rescue mission to save a retired FBI agent captured in Iran. The mission to save the American, Robert Levinson, was scuttled on the insistence of Clinton’s State Department.
While Clinton’s apparent role in blocking the rescue mission has been previously reported, Deripaska’s remarks to John Solomon represent his first public confirmation of what occurred.
Scuttled rescue
Deripaska’a role in the botched mission has been described as a potential conflict of interest for Robert Mueller in relation to his controversial Russia probe. According to Deripaska, the FBI — then led by Mueller — came looking for his help in 2009 to save Levinson, who had gone missing in Iran on a 2007 CIA mission. The Russian oligarch said he was directly approached by former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe.
“I was approached, you know, by someone that he is under a lot of scrutiny now — McCabe,” Deripaska said. “He also said that it was important enough for all of them [FBI officials]. And I kind of trusted them.”
According to Deripaska, he spent $20 million of his own money between 2009 and 2011 on a rescue team. The team came close to a deal with Iran, and Deripaska’s group even received images from the Iranians proving that Levinson was still alive.
However, the deal fell apart after the State Department intervened. The Hill’s John Solomon previously reported that officials there were uncomfortable with Iran’s terms, but according to Deripaska, the truth was that the department simply did not want to be in his debt.
“I heard that some Russian ‘hand,’ or whatever you call people who are expert on the Russians at the State Department, [said], ‘We just don’t want to owe anything to this guy,’” Deripaska said, noting that he wasn’t expecting any favors back.
Deripaska added that he does not believe Levinson, who has not been seen since, is still alive. He asserted that Levinson, if living, would likely have returned in 2016, after former President Obama signed off on the Iran nuclear deal.
Troubling connections
Deripaska’s interview comes as Mueller, after previously saying he would not appear before Congress, is expected to testify on July 17. The former special counsel formally concluded his probe with a brief press conference in May.
The Russian’s involvement in the Levinson mission has been cited as a possible conflict of interest for Mueller, who investigated Deripaska’s Russian connections as part of the sprawling Trump collusion investigation. Some have suggested that Mueller’s FBI may have aided the Russian in obtaining visas and passports for entry into the U.S.. Deripaska had struggled for years to secure American visas due to alleged ties to the Russian mafia, but reportedly received a rare law enforcement parole visa in 2009.
It has also been suggested that Mueller’s team may have acted with prejudice against a former business associate who had a falling out with Deripaska, namely, Paul Manafort. The Russian confirmed to The Hill that he was interviewed by FBI agents in 2016 — months before Mueller took over the Russia probe in May 2017 — and told the agents that he found laughable the assertion that Manafort, Trump’s former campaign manager, had colluded with Russians. But Mueller’s team never gave Deripaska’s exculpatory interview to Manafort’s lawyers, according to Manafort’s lawyer Kevin Downing.
The original investigation of Manafort was for collusion, but he was convicted and sentenced to prison for separate financial crimes. Mueller’s omission of the fact that a well-placed Russian doubted the collusion theory calls into question his investigation of Manafort and indeed of Russian collusion altogether, Downing said.
Tangled web
Strangely, Deripaska’s Mueller-Clinton connections go further: the Russian hired none other than British spy Christopher Steele, the man behind the infamous Russia dossier, for research in a 2012 lawsuit against a business rival. Deripaska said that Steele, who he did not then know was working for the FBI, attempted to recruit Deripaska as a Russian intelligence source. The Russian said that Steele met with him in 2015 and dangled visa help as an enticement, which Deripaska called a “pretext.”
Deripaska said he was shocked when Steele’s name popped up again amid the Russia collusion hysteria. Steele’s dossier, which was funded in part by the Clinton campaign through opposition research firm Fusion GPS, played an important role in sparking the investigation into whether Trump colluded with Russia. Mueller did not find that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia, and although the special counsel identified instances of possible obstruction of justice by Trump, he declined to either charge or exonerate Trump of the crime.
Between the Russia dossier and the botched mission to save Levinson, more and more reasons come to light as to why Clinton’s defeat was a win for the country.
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