January 10, 2018

House Democrats Demand Treasury Secretary’s Recusal on Trump Finance Questions

They are pushing the agency for information on the financial ties of the Trumps and Kushners.

AP Photo/John Locher

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There’s no shortage of acid-drenched comments from Steve Bannon about Donald Trump and his family in Michael Wolff’s new book Fire and Fury, but one passage in particular has caught the attention of House Democrats attempting to investigate the financial ties of the Trump and Kushner families.

“You realize where this is going,” Bannon told Wolff, referring to the special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation. “This is all about money laundering. Mueller chose [senior prosecutor Andrew] Weissmann first and he is a money-laundering guy. Their path to fucking Trump goes right through Paul Manafort, Don Jr. and Jared Kushner… It’s as plain as a hair on your face… It goes through Deutsche Bank and all the Kushner shit. The Kushner shit is greasy. They’re going to go right through that.”

In a new letter, five top Democrats on the House financial services committee, led by ranking member Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.), are demanding Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin offer up his agency’s resources in tracking financial crimes to investigate possible money laundering by the Trumps and Kushners. The committee’s Democrats previously asked Mnuchin to turn over data from Treasury’s Financial Intelligence Unit relating to Trump and Kushner investments. Mnuchin didn’t respond, but the committee’s Democrats now emphasize the importance of probing possible money laundering.

“This troubling account from a Trump campaign senior official underscores the need for your compliance with our request,” the letter says.

Additionally, Waters and her fellow committee Democrats are requesting that Mnuchin, who was the Trump campaign’s finance chairman, answer questions about any improper foreign influence on the campaign’s finances—and recuse himself from any law enforcement or regulatory activity involving Trump and his family.

The letter can be read below: 



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We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

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