The Saudi Connections
Have you seen this thread by @gal_suburban? LOOK at Trump exec order signed 5th Jan 21: see how the Saudis are so keen to develop small nuclear reactors?
This is the thread and it's a long read: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1557967281224908803.html
This is a kick-ass thread. Amazing research.
Nuscale rang a bell. There’s a decommissioned uranium enrichment plant in Portsmouth OH.
A lot of shady coal/energy stuff happens in the OH River Valley.
@JDVance1 made this one of his first post-primary campaign stops. I thought it was a weird priority at the time. Sounds totally different now. He’s been pushing nuclear energy, and I was wondering WTH, this isn’t an Ohio issue.
People need to read this to see how valuable and sensitive information on this technology is . It can be profitable to the unscrupulous and dangerous if it gets in the wrong hands.
1/5/21: Trump signs odd executive order re small modular nuclear reactors (which Saudis are super keen on) whilst Jared has meeting with Saudis in
1/6/21: Capitol Riot coup, Jared flies back to
May 21: Jared gets $2 billion Saudi “investment into a wealth fund” Hmm
Rereading with with my hair on fire https://oversight.house.gov/sites/democrats.oversight.house.gov/files/Trump%20Saudi%20Nuclear%20Report%20-%202-19-2019.pdf
FLASHBACK (FEBRUARY 2019): "Whistleblowers Raise Grave Concerns with Trump Administration’s Efforts to Transfer Sensitive Nuclear Technology to Saudi Arabia"
I remember this report because I wrote about it when it came out in February 2019. My story:
Since leaving office, the Saudis have "invested" $2 billion with Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and paid Trump untold sums to host two professional golf tournaments at his properties
We don't know why Trump took classified nuclear docs. But certain nuclear information would have very high economic value to Saudi Arabia and other governments. For more accountability journalism that follows the money, sign up for Popular Information
Good. Thanks! Kushner Barak Townsend going on cbs fox and others defending the Saudis over k murder. Saudis murdered khashoggi bc he was exposing this? And Jared was fine with it bc he got the deal w/westinghouse? S get 40 nuclear reactors?
July 20, 2022
On Sunday, the families of some 9/11 victims sent a letter to Donald Trump about his decision to host a professional golf tournament sponsored by the Saudi government next week at his golf course in Bedminster, New Jersey. “It is incomprehensible to us that a former president of the United States would cast our loved ones aside for personal financial gain,” they wrote. “We hope you will reconsider your business relationship with the Saudi golf league and will agree to meet with us.”
The group of families, which calls itself 9/11 Justice, has been pressing a lawsuit for years that claims the Saudi government was complicit in the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. During the 2016 campaign, Trump himself suggested that Saudi Arabia was responsible for 9/11, the families reminded him. Trump didn’t reply to their letter immediately, which wasn’t surprising given the financial ties that he and his family have established with the Saudis. In 2018, as President, he protected Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, widely known as M.B.S., after Saudi agents brutally murdered and dismembered the Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi. (“I saved his ass,” Trump subsequently boasted to Bob Woodward.)
Last year, the kingdom’s Public Investment Fund, which M.B.S. heads, agreed to invest two billion dollars in a fledgling private-equity fund that Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, was setting up. The Saudis overruled objections from some of their advisers regarding Kushner’s firm and its lack of experience. Earlier this year, the new Saudi-backed professional golfing league, liv Golf, which has been spending money like water to recruit players and rival the long-established P.G.A. Tour, reached an agreement with Trump to stage two of its tournaments at courses he owns. (The second tournament is scheduled to be held at Trump National Doral Miami, in October.) The financial terms of this arrangement haven’t been disclosed, but hosting the liv events will certainly help bolster the finances of Trump’s golf business, which has lost hundreds of millions of dollars over the years, according to a 2020 Times investigation.
On Monday, Trump finally delivered a response of sorts to the 9/11 families: a kiss-off. Writing on his struggling social-media platform, he advised those professional golfers who haven’t joined the Saudi tour, known in some circles as the “Bonesaw Tour,” to “take the money now” or risk getting nothing when liv’s dispute with the P.G.A. Tour is eventually settled. In typical fashion, Trump didn’t mention 9/11, the protest letter he received, Jamal Khashoggi, or the fact that the Saudi government, through its investments in golf, soccer, and other professional sports, is clearly trying to divert attention from its repressive and autocratic nature.
“This is part of a broader play by the Saudi regime,” John Hursh, the program director at Democracy for the Arab World Now, a research and advocacy group that Jamal Khashoggi co-founded before Saudi agents lured him to the Saudi Embassy in Istanbul, told me. “It’s designed to change the narrative so that people aren’t looking at things like 9/11 or the recent execution of eighty-one people in one day.” Rather than acknowledging any of these things, Trump, in his social-media post, wrote, “All of those golfers that remain ‘loyal’ to the very disloyal PGA, in all of its different forms, will pay a big price when the inevitable MERGER with LIV comes, and you get nothing but a big ‘thank you’ from PGA officials who are making Millions of Dollars a year.”
In its moral bankruptcy, clumsy timing, and thinly disguised score-settling, this was a typically Trumpian outburst, and it will surely be followed up by more. When the tournament starts next week in New Jersey, Trump will almost certainly be on hand to wallow in the attention; greet his fellow-sucklers of the Saudi teat, such as Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson; and raise a middle finger to the P.G.A. Tour, which, in 2016, during Trump’s successful Presidential campaign, withdrew a big tournament from another course he owns, Trump National Doral, in Miami, infuriating him.
It’s no secret that Trump’s passion for golf is only exceeded by his craving for attention and approval. Even as he talks openly about the possibility of launching a 2024 Presidential bid in the next few months, he remains fixated on the game. Since buying the New Jersey course, in 2002, he has invested heavily in making it worthy of staging one of golf’s four major championships. But in January of last year, after the attack on the Capitol by Trump supporters, the P.G.A. of America, which represents club professionals and is separate from the P.G.A. Tour, switched the 2022 P.G.A.
Championship from Bedminster to a non-Trump course, Southern Hills, in Oklahoma. “My son, who’s a great guy, called,” Trump told the golf writer Michael Bamberger. “My son said, ‘Dad, they’re canceling the PGA Championship [at Trump Bedminster]. I said, ‘That’s terrible. Really? Are you serious?’ ”
Hosting a glorified exhibition match like next week’s event, the third of eight tournaments that liv Golf is holding this year, doesn’t compare with hosting a “major” like the P.G.A. Championship or the British Open, which provided a thrilling finish at St. Andrews on Sunday. But, in addition to fattening Trump’s wallet, the Bedminster tournament will heighten the pressure on the P.G.A. Tour, which is still trying to come to terms with a Saudi challenge that is being fronted by the two-time major champion Greg Norman.
With liv Golf having so far failed to obtain a U.S. television deal, and with its first two tournaments—in London and Portland, Oregon—having attracted a pitifully small online audience, it is tempting to conclude that the M.B.S.–Norman–Trump axis is destined to fail in its effort to mimic in golf Trump’s surprise takeover of the Republican Party. It’s too early to reach that determination, though. In professional sports these days, money usually prevails. And, with a reputed budget of two billion dollars, Norman and his colleagues seem determined to soak up financial losses and sweep away the existing structure of golf, which is dominated by the P.G.A., a not-for-profit organization based in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida.
The sums they are offering players to sign long-term contracts with liv are unheard of in the sport. (Mickelson and Johnson are said to have received more than one hundred million dollars each.) So far, most of the top-ranked players have rebuffed the Saudi entreaties and stuck with the P.G.A. Tour. (The loyalists include Rory McIlroy, Justin Thomas, Jordan Spieth, and Scottie Scheffler.) Many of the defectors are older players who appear to regard the liv tour as a lucrative pension scheme. But Norman and his colleagues aren’t done yet. Last month, they recruited three younger American stars: Bryson DeChambeau, Patrick Reed, and Brooks Koepka. The golf world is rife with talk of further defections emerging before the Bedminster event, including possibly Cameron Smith, the Australian winner of the British Open, and Hideki Matsuyama, the Japanese winner of the 2021 Masters. The ambitions of liv Golf are global: Smith and Matsuyama are both big stars in Asia.
Like the G.O.P. that Trump conquered, the P.G.A. Tour and its European counterpart, the D.P. World Tour, seem ill prepared to deal with an invasion of vandals—especially ones wielding a Saudi checkbook. Last month, the P.G.A. Tour announced it would ban players who participated in liv events from any events it organizes, including the season-ending FedEx Cup, but it’s not clear whether this ruling will withstand legal scrutiny. Norman called the ban “anti-competitive,” and the P.G.A. Tour has confirmed that the Justice Department is investigating it for possible antitrust violations.
The P.G.A. Tour has also moved to increase prize money. But Jay Monahan, the P.G.A. Tour commissioner, has publicly admitted that his organization can’t compete with liv Golf in financial terms, and neither can other tours around the world. One pointed comparison: when Smith shot a remarkable 64 on Sunday to snatch the British Open from McIlroy and others, he received a first prize of $2.5 million. Earlier this month, when the South African Branden Grace won a no-name liv event in Portland, the first staged on U.S. soil, he won a first prize of four million dollars, plus three hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars as a member of a team that finished second.
As usual, Trump is zeroing in on his enemies’ weak spot and trying to strong-arm more players into taking the Saudi loot. As someone with decades of experience in putting money-making ahead of decency and everything else, he certainly knows whereof he speaks, but nothing can disguise what’s really happening here. “No matter what M.B.S. does in the rest of his life, the first paragraph of his obituary is going to include a reference to Jamal Khashoggi,” Hursh told me. The launch of the liv tour won’t alter that fact, but it has cemented the relationship between the House of Saud and the House of Trump. “I wouldn’t be surprised if there are more deals between them,” Hursh added. ♦
An earlier version of this piece misstated the name of the organization that removed Bedminster from the P.G.A. Championship following the events of January 6th.
WASHINGTON — Senior White House officials pushed a project to share nuclear power technology with Saudi Arabia despite the objections of ethics and national security officials, according to a new congressional report citing whistleblowers within the administration.
Lawmakers from both parties have expressed concerns that Saudi Arabia could develop nuclear weapons if the U.S. technology were transferred without proper safeguards.
The Democratic-led House oversight committee opened an investigation Tuesday into the claims by several unnamed whistleblowers who said they witnessed “abnormal acts” in the White House regarding the proposal to build dozens of nuclear reactors across the Middle Eastern kingdom.
The report raises concerns about whether some in a White House marked by “chaos, dysfunction, and backbiting” sought to circumvent established national security procedures regarding nuclear power technology. It also comes as Trump son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner is developing a Middle East peace plan that could include economic proposals for Saudi Arabia.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
According to the report, the effort was pushed by former national security adviser Michael Flynn, who was fired in early 2017. Derek Harvey, a National Security Council official brought in by Flynn, continued work on the proposal, which has remained under consideration by the Trump administration.
Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland, the chairman of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, announced the investigation Tuesday.
Relying on the whistleblower accounts, email and other documents , the committee’s report details how NSC and ethics officials repeatedly warned that the actions of Flynn and one of his senior aides could run afoul of federal conflicts of interest law and statutes governing the transfer of nuclear technology to foreign powers.
The probe puts new scrutiny on Flynn’s early days in the administration as he awaits sentencing for lying to the FBI in the Russia investigation. Congressional investigators are also probing the role of Tom Barrack, a proponent of the nuclear proposal who ran Trump’s presidential inaugural committee, which is separately under investigation by federal prosecutors in New York. Rick Gates, a former Barrack employee and cooperator in special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation, was also involved in advocating for the nuclear proposal.
An attorney for Flynn declined to comment. Harvey and representatives for Barrack did not immediately return requests for comment.
According to the report, the whistleblowers came forward to the committee because they had concerns “about efforts inside the White House to rush the transfer of highly sensitive U.S. nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia in potential violation of the Atomic Energy Act and without review by Congress as required by law — efforts that may be ongoing to this day.”
The report tracks closely with public reporting, including a 2017 article by the nonprofit news outlet ProPublica, which detailed some of the concerns raised inside the National Security Council about the nuclear proposal — known as the “Marshall Plan for the Middle East — advocated by a company called IP3 International.
IP3 is led by a group of retired U.S. military officers and national security officials, including retired Rear Adm. Michael Hewitt, retired Army Gen. Jack Keane and former Reagan national security adviser Bud McFarlane. IP3 and other proponents of nuclear power in the Middle East argue that the U.S. needs to be involved because otherwise it will lose out to Russia, China and others on billions of dollars in business. They also say that the U.S. involvement — and the limits on nuclear fuel that come with it— are essential to stem an arms race in the region.
IP3 did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Up until the month before he joined the Trump administration, Flynn listed himself as a consultant to a previous iteration of Hewitt’s company advocating a similar nuclear power proposal, though the company told The Washington Post that Flynn was offered a role as an adviser but never formally came aboard.
Still, according to the report, Flynn served as a conduit for IP3 inside the White House.
Just days after Trump’s inauguration, the company sent Flynn a draft memo for the president’s signature that would have appointed Barrack as a “special representative” in charge of carrying out the nuclear power proposal and called on the director of the CIA and the secretaries of State, Energy, Treasury and Defense to lend him support. The report also quotes former deputy national security adviser K.T. McFarland as saying Trump personally told Barrack he could lead the plan’s implementation.
The report also catalogs the actions of Harvey, the Flynn confidant who was put in charge of the NSC’s Middle East and North African affairs.
According to the report, upon entering the White House in January 2017, Harvey saw his mission as getting Trump to adopt the nuclear proposal despite the objections of ethics and national security officials. Even when H.R. McMaster, who replaced Flynn as national security adviser, and NSC lawyer John Eisenberg directed for work to stop on the proposal because of concerns about its legality, Harvey ignored them and continued pursuing the proposal, according to the report.
Harvey was fired from the NSC in July 2017. He then joined the staff of GOP Rep. Devin Nunes of California, a Trump ally and the former Republican chairman of the House intelligence committee.
Associated Press writers Darlene Superville, Ben Fox and Stephen Braun in Washington, Jim Mustian in New York and Jon Gambrell in Dubai, United Arab Emirates contributed to this report.
Remember this quote from Woodward's book? "I have a nuclear — a weapons system that nobody's ever had before. We have stuff that you haven't even seen or heard about. We have stuff that Putin and Xi have never heard about before." -Donald Trump, 2019
Special counsel should have been appointed. House investigates 'White House plan' to share nuclear technology with Saudis
Top White House officials pushed a plan to share nuclear technology with Saudi Arabia, despite objections from career national security staff, according to a new congressional report.
The report from the House oversight committee said that whistleblowers within the Trump administration have come forward to warn about the proposed nuclear power deal, which could violate the law.
The Democratic-controlled committee has launched an investigation into the whistleblowers’ claims, its chairman, Maryland representative Elijah Cummings, said Tuesday.
Donald Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn was a key backer of the plan for a consortium of US companies to build dozens of nuclear power plants in Saudi Arabia, according to the report’s account.
During the presidential campaign and transition, Flynn was listed as an adviser to a subsidiary of IP3 International, the company behind the power plant proposal.
Flynn was fired in 2017 and has since pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI in the Russia investigation. But planning for the Saudi nuclear project may be ongoing to this day, according to the report.
“The whistleblowers who came forward have expressed significant concerns about the potential procedural and legal violations connected with rushing through a plan to transfer nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia. They have warned of conflicts of interest among top White House advisers that could implicate federal criminal statutes,” the report said.
“They have also warned about a working environment inside the White House marked by chaos, dysfunction and backbiting.”
Career and political staff at the White House repeatedly warned that an order to proceed with the nuclear power plant plan could violate the law, since it did not comply with steps required by the Atomic Energy Act. Without proper safeguards, technology transferred for use in power plants could be used to create nuclear weapons.
Lawyers at the National Security Council also warned that Flynn had a conflict of interest that might break the law, and the council’s legal adviser, John Eisenberg, ordered NSC staff to stop all work on the plan, according to the report. But the White House continued to pursue it.
The report also cites the role of Trump’s son in law, Jared Kushner. A top NSC official told colleagues that he was promoting the IP3 plan “so that Jared Kushner can present it to the president for approval”, according to the whistleblowers’ account.
Kushner plans a tour of the Middle East next week, with a stop in the Saudi capital of Riyadh, to discuss economic aspects of the administration’s Middle East peace plan.
The report notes a complex financial connection between Kushner and the plan to build nuclear power plants in Saudi Arabia. Brookfield Asset Management, the company that eased a financial crunch for Kushner’s family by taking over a troubled Manhattan property, has acquired Westinghouse Electric, the bankrupt nuclear services company that is one of the firms participating in the Saudi nuclear deal.
Trump met with nuclear power developers at the White House just last week to discuss sharing nuclear technology with Middle Eastern countries, including Saudi Arabia.
“Further investigation is needed to determine whether the actions being pursued by the Trump administration are in the national security interest of the United States, or, rather, serve those who stand to gain financially as a result of this potential change in US foreign policy,” the committee said in its report.
Cummings, a Maryland Democrat, said he had attempted to begin an investigation of the Saudi nuclear talks before this year, but was blocked when Republicans controlled the committee.
The White House has so far not commented on the report.
There's a reason Jared Kushner's security clearance was denied!!!
WASHINGTON — Jared Kushner's application for a top-secret clearance was rejected by two career White House security specialists after an FBI background check raised concerns about potential foreign influence on him — but their supervisor overruled the recommendation and approved the clearance, two sources familiar with the matter told NBC News.
The official, Carl Kline, is a former Pentagon employee who was installed as director of the personnel security office in the Executive Office of the President in May 2017. Kushner's was one of at least 30 cases in which Kline overruled career security experts and approved a top-secret clearance for incoming Trump officials despite unfavorable information, the two sources said. They said the number of rejections that were overruled was unprecedented — it had happened only once in the three years preceding Kline's arrival.
The sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the information, said the Trump White House attracted many people with untraditional backgrounds who had complicated financial and personal histories, some of which raised red flags.
Kushner's FBI background check identified questions about his family's business, his foreign contacts, his foreign travel and meetings he had during the campaign, the sources said, declining to be more specific.
The White House office only determines eligibility for secret and top-secret clearances. As a very senior official, Kushner was seeking an even higher designation that would grant him access to what is known as "sensitive compartmented information," or SCI. That material makes up the government's most sensitive secrets, including transcripts of intercepted foreign communications, CIA source reporting and other intelligence seemingly important for Kushner, whose job portfolio covers the Mideast and Mexico.
The CIA is the agency that decides whether to grant SCI clearance to senior White House officials after conducting a further background check.
After Kline overruled the White House security specialists and recommended Kushner for a top-secret clearance, Kushner's file then went to the CIA for a ruling on SCI.
After reviewing the file, CIA officers who make clearance decisions balked, two of the people familiar with the matter said. One called over to the White House security division, wondering how Kushner got even a top-secret clearance, the sources said. Top-secret information is defined as material that would cause "exceptionally grave damage" to national security if disclosed to adversaries.
The sources say the CIA has not granted Kushner clearance to review SCI material. That would mean Kushner lacks access to key intelligence unless President Donald Trump decides to override the rules, which is the president's' prerogative. The Washington Post reported in July 2018 that Kushner was not given an "SCI" clearance. CIA spokesman Timothy Barrett said, "The CIA does not comment on individual security clearances."
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders said the same: "We don't comment on security clearances."
NBC News was unable to reach Kline for comment. Kushner's lawyer, Abbe Lowell, had no comment.
Rep. Elijah Cummings, D.-Md., chairman of the House Oversight and Reform Committee, said in a statement that the NBC News report raised questions he hopes to answer as part of his investigation, announced this week, into how the Trump administration has handled security clearances.
“The system is supposed to be a nonpartisan determination of an individual’s fitness to hold a clearance, not an ad hoc approach that overrules career experts to give the president’s family members access to our nation’s most sensitive secrets,” he told NBC News.
"What you are reporting is what all of us feared," said Brad Moss, a lawyer who represents persons seeking security clearances. "The normal line adjudicators looked at the FBI report … saw the foreign influence concerns, but were overruled by the quasi-political supervisor."
The sources said they did not know whether Kline was in communication with senior political White House officials. They say he overruled career bureaucrats at least 30 times, granting top-secret clearances to officials in the Executive Office of the President or the White House after adjudicators working for him recommended against doing so.
Kline left the White House personnel security office at least a week ago and is now back at the Department of Defense, according to the Pentagon press office.
The reasons for denying a clearance can include debts, a criminal past or questions about foreign entanglements. Anything in a person's background that could make them vulnerable to blackmail can be a factor.
Kushner's application followed the normal path for security clearance. It passed a "suitability review" in the White House and then went to the FBI for a background investigation.
Following the FBI investigation, the case went back to the White House office of personnel security, where a career adjudicator reviewed the FBI information, including questions about foreign influence and foreign business entanglements, the sources said.
The Washington Post, citing current and former U.S. officials familiar with intelligence reports on the matter, reported last February that officials in at least four countries had privately discussed ways they could manipulate Kushner by taking advantage of his complex business arrangements, financial difficulties and lack of foreign policy experience.
Kushner's application followed the normal path for security clearance. It passed a "suitability review" in the White House and then went to the FBI for a background investigation.
Following the FBI investigation, the case went back to the White House office of personnel security, where a career adjudicator reviewed the FBI information, including questions about foreign influence and foreign business entanglements, the sources said.
The Washington Post, citing current and former U.S. officials familiar with intelligence reports on the matter, reported last February that officials in at least four countries had privately discussed ways they could manipulate Kushner by taking advantage of his complex business arrangements, financial difficulties and lack of foreign policy experience.
The supervisor agreed with the "unfavorable" determination and gave it to Kline, the head of the office at the time, who overruled the "unfavorable" determination and approved Kushner for "top secret" security clearance, the sources said.
"No one else gets that kind of treatment," Moss said. "My clients would get body slammed if they did that."
Sources also told NBC News career employees of the White House office disagreed with other steps Kline took, including ceasing credit checks on security clearance applicants. The sources said Kline cited a data breach at the credit reporting firm Equifax.
Kline is the subject of an October 2018 Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaint viewed by NBC News that was filed by Tricia Newbold, a current employee. Newbold has a rare form of dwarfism and the complaint alleges Kline discriminated against her because of her height.
Her complaint states that, in December 2017, Kline moved security files to a new location that was too high and out of her reach and told her, "You have people, have them get you the files you need; or you can ask me."
Her attorney, Ed Passman, told NBC News, "My client has been subjected to ongoing discrimination by a ruthless supervisor who was destroying the personnel security division by granting security clearances over the objections of civil servant recommendations."
In a letter to her family obtained by NBC News, Newbold described Kline's behavior toward her as "aggressive," involving "emotional and psychological abuse" starting in July 2017, a few months after he took over the office.
In the same letter, Newbold wrote that she also had serious concerns about how Kline "continuously changes policy" and makes "reckless security judgments." She added that Kline's decisions "if disclosed, can cause embarrassment and negative attention to the administration."
Newbold raised concerns about Kline's behavior with her second level supervisor regarding his "hostility and integrity," according to the EEOC complaint.
The Executive Office of the President investigated Newbold’s claims from the EEOC complaint. Newbold's attorney is now waiting to hear if his client will be granted a hearing.
June 3, 2022
WASHINGTON — The House Oversight Committee has launched an investigation into a $2 billion investment by the Saudi government into a firm formed by Jared Kushner after he left the White House last year.
Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., wrote in a letter to Kushner that her committee is looking into the investment by the sovereign wealth fund of Saudi Arabia, which is controlled by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, into Kushner's firm Affinity.
The probe will focus on whether Kushner's personal financial interests improperly influenced U.S. foreign policy while he served in the White House under his father-in-law, former President Donald Trump, Maloney wrote in the letter.
"Your support for Saudi interests was unwavering, even as Congress and the rest of the world closely scrutinized the country’s human rights abuses in Yemen, the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi assassins tied to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and Saudi Arabia’s crackdown on political dissidents at home," Maloney wrote.
Representatives for Kushner and Affinity did not immediately return requests for comment. A request for comment from the Saudi Public Investment Fund also was not immediately returned.
The New York Times first reported the committee's investigation. In a statement to the newspaper, a spokesman for Kushner said, “While achieving six peace deals in the Middle East, Mr. Kushner fully abided by all legal and ethical guidelines both during and after his government service.”
Maloney said the investigation will help inform the committee about whether federal ethics laws need to be strengthened so that senior public officials can't take advantage of their government roles to benefit financially.
She noted that Kushner created his investment firm the day after Trump left the White House in January 2021 and the Saudi government gave it the $2 billion six months later.
"The Committee is concerned by your decision to solicit billions of dollars from the Saudi government immediately following your significant involvement in shaping U.S.-Saudi relations," Maloney said, adding that Kushner's close relationship with the crown prince as well as his pro-Saudi positions during the Trump administration and the Saudi government's funding "create the appearance of a quid pro quo for your foreign policy work during the Trump Administration."
Maloney said she wants Kushner and his firm to produce documents, including records and personal communications, by June 16.
And now recall this tweet from Asha in part 2:
Just to head off at the pass that Trump could have unilaterally declassified nuclear secrets (which is irrelevant to the Espionage Act), not true. 36 CFR. Ch. 11, Sec. 1260.28 (h/t @LSurteesTdot) requires Dept. of Energy sign off
Now recall this moment after the election:
The Trump administration abruptly dumped the leaders of three agencies that oversee the nuclear weapons stockpile, electricity and natural gas regulation, and overseas aid during the past two days, drawing a rebuke from a prominent Republican senator for one of the decisions.
The sudden departures included:
Lisa Gordon-Hagerty, administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration, the first woman to oversee the agency in charge of the nuclear stockpile. She was required to resign on Friday.
Bonnie Glick, deputy administrator of the U.S. Agency for International Development. She was replaced by acting Administrator John Barsa, who had run out of time for his more senior role under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act.
Neil Chatterjee, chairman of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and a former aide to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. He was replaced as chairman, though he will remain at FERC, an independent agency, as a commissioner.
The firings were overshadowed by the prolonged drama of the presidential election.
The White House declined comment on the firings and declined to say whether there would be more in the wake of the election.
Sen. Jim Inhofe, the Republican chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, issued a statement criticizing Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette, who he said "effectively demanded" the resignation of Gordon-Hagerty. (The National Nuclear Security Administration is a semi-autonomous agency that is part of the Energy Department.)
Inhofe called Gordon-Hagerty "an exemplary public servant and remarkable leader" and said Brouillette's decision "during this time of uncertainty demonstrates he doesn't know what he's doing in national security matters and shows a complete lack of respect for the semi-autonomous nature of NNSA."
Then recall the Executive Order Trump signed pertaining to Saudi Arabia on January 5th the day before the INSURRECTION that was to keep Trump in power.
Seems like there was an intentional plot to sell nuclear secrets to Saudi Arabia.
THREAD: NUCLEAR DOCS: one of Flynn’s goals with trump as president was to build reactors in Saudi Arabia & have Eric Prince supply private armies to guard them in an effort to “re-colonize” the Middle East. It was called the Middle East Marshall Plan. 1/
I remember reporting that Flynn was texting his business partner Copson on the dais at trumps inauguration (managed by Tom Barrack who was recently indicted for “espionage light” lobbying Donald for UAE). 2/
I also remember Donald and David Pecker (who had a safe full of kompromat and helped Donald “catch and kill” a Donald mistress story) publishing a huge magazine about how awesome Saudi and UAE leaders were. 3/
I also remember when Donald ignored his Magnitsky Act obligations after the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, providing cover for MBS. 4/
I also remember when Mitch McConnell wanted a test reactor in Kentucky so he blocked restrictions on Donald giving nuclear information to Saudi Arabia. 5/
And then trump awarded nuclear permits to Saudi Arabia after the killing of Khashoggi. 6/
Then kushner gave INTEL to Saudi Arabia about traitors to the crown and the crown prince said kushner was in his pocket. 7/
And then Saudi Arabia gave Kushner $2B to invest despite being advised not to. 8/
Then Donald hosted the saudis at his golf club recently and the trophy looked like the burnt out ruins of the WTC. 9/
So am I surprised to learn today that some of the documents Donald stole and kept at MAL had to do with nuclear weapons? No I am not. END
SORRY: forgot to mention that the saudis wanted reactors so they could get uranium to make weapons
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