Today in collusion

In his interview with three New York Times reporters yesterday — an interview most notable for the dissatisfaction he expressed with Attorney General Sessions on account of his recusal from the Special Counsel investigation — President Trump was asked if the investigation would cross a red line if it expanded to look at his family’s finances beyond any relationship to Russia. “I would say yes,” Trump responded, though he would not say what he would do about it. “I think that’s a violation. Look, this is about Russia.”

Today comes word via Bloomberg that that the Special Counsel investigation extends to “a broad range of transactions involving Trump’s businesses as well as those of his associates….FBI investigators and others are looking at Russian purchases of apartments in Trump buildings, Trump’s involvement in a controversial SoHo development in New York with Russian associates, the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow and Trump’s sale of a Florida mansion to a Russian oligarch in 2008[.]”

On a related note, the New York Times reports on a possible investigatory angle involving loans to Trump businesses from Deutsche Bank. According to the Times, “the bank is expecting to eventually have to provide information to Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel overseeing the federal investigation into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia.” And then comes the usual qualification: “It was not clear what information the bank might ultimately provide.” And even the Times is unable to come up with a hypothetical Russian connection to the Deutsche Bank loans to Trump businesses. As the Times puts it, “there is no indication of a Russian connection to Mr. Trump’s loans or accounts at Deutsche Bank, people briefed on the matter said.”

In the words of the song, something’s gotta give

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