WASHINGTON
— The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, has subpoenaed the Trump
Organization to turn over documents, including some related to Russia,
according to two people briefed on the matter. The order is the first
known instance of the special counsel demanding records directly related
to President Trump’s businesses, bringing the investigation closer to
the president.
The
breadth of the subpoena was not clear, nor was it clear why Mr. Mueller
issued it instead of simply asking for the documents from the company,
an umbrella organization that oversees Mr. Trump’s business ventures. In
the subpoena, delivered in recent weeks, Mr. Mueller ordered the Trump
Organization to hand over all records related to Russia and other topics
he is investigating, the people said.
The
subpoena is the latest indication that the investigation, which Mr.
Trump’s lawyers once regularly assured him would be completed by now,
will drag on for at least several more months. Word of the subpoena
comes as Mr. Mueller appears to be broadening his investigation
to examine the role foreign money may have played in funding Mr.
Trump’s political activities. In recent weeks, Mr. Mueller’s
investigators have questioned witnesses, including an adviser to the United Arab Emirates, about the flow of Emirati money into the United States.
The
Trump Organization has typically complied with requests from
congressional investigators for documents for their own inquiries into
Russian election interference, and there was no indication the company
planned to fight Mr. Mueller’s order.
“Since
July 2017, we have advised the public that the Trump Organization is
fully cooperative with all investigations, including the special
counsel, and is responding to their requests,” said Alan S. Futerfas, a
lawyer representing the Trump Organization. “This is old news and our
assistance and cooperation with the various investigations remains the
same today.”
The
White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, reiterated during
her daily briefing that the president was cooperating with the inquiry
and referred questions to the Trump Organization.
The
Trump Organization has said that it never had real estate holdings in
Russia, but witnesses recently interviewed by Mr. Mueller have been
asked about a possible real estate deal in Moscow. In 2015, a longtime
business associate of Mr. Trump’s emailed Mr. Trump’s lawyer, Michael Cohen,
at his Trump Organization account claiming he had ties to President
Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and said that building a Trump Tower in
Moscow would help Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign.
Mr. Trump signed a nonbinding “letter of intent” for the project in 2015 and discussed it three times with Mr. Cohen.
Mr.
Mueller could run afoul of a line the president has warned him not to
cross. Though it is not clear how much of the subpoena is related to Mr.
Trump’s business beyond ties to Russia, Mr. Trump said in an interview
with The New York Times in July that the special counsel would be crossing a “red line”
if he looked into his family’s finances beyond any relationship with
Russia. The president declined to say how he would respond if he
concluded that the special counsel had crossed that line.
A
month before Mr. Trump spoke of his red line, the White House counsel,
Donald F. McGahn II, threatened to quit after Mr. Trump asked him to
have Mr. Mueller fired because the president believed he had
conflict-of-interest issues that precluded him from running the special
counsel investigation.
Mr.
Mueller was appointed in May to investigate whether Mr. Trump’s
campaign colluded with the Russians to influence the 2016 presidential
election and any other matters that may arise from the inquiry. He is
also examining whether the president has tried to obstruct the
investigation.
Mr.
Trump’s lawyers are in negotiations with Mr. Mueller’s office about
whether and how to allow his investigators to interview the president.
Mr. Mueller’s office has shared topics it wants to discuss with the
president, according to two people familiar with the talks. The lawyers have advised Mr. Trump
to refuse an interview but the president wants to do it, as he believes
he has done nothing wrong and can easily answer investigators’
questions.
At
the same time, Mr. Trump is considering whether to bring on a new
lawyer to help represent him in the special counsel’s investigation.
Last week, Mr. Trump spoke with Emmet Flood,
a longtime Washington lawyer who represented former President Bill
Clinton during the impeachment process, about coming into the White
House to deal with the inquiry.
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