Jesse Benton, former campaign manager for Rand Paul and McConnell, facing federal charges

[TexasTowelie]

Source: Louisville Courier Journal

A former campaign manager for both of Kentucky's U.S. senators, who was convicted on criminal charges in 2016 and pardoned by President Trump in late 2020, is facing more federal charges.

Jesse Benton has been indicted on multiple counts, including conspiracy to solicit and cause an illegal campaign contribution by a foreign national, the Department of Justice said in a statement Monday.

Benton is accused of "conspiring" with Roy Douglas “Doug” Wead of Florida "to solicit a political contribution from a Russian foreign national."

Wead told the foreign national he could arrange for them to meet with a 2016 presidential candidate "in exchange for a payment," the Justice Department says in court documents.

Read more: https://www.courier-journal.com/story/news/politics/2021/09/20/jesse-benton-indicted-rand-paul-mitch-mcconnell-former-campaign-manager/5791086001/

[Sherman A1]

1. Gee,

Couldn’t happen to a “nicer” guy………

[TexasTowelie]

2. I'll embellish your comment for funsies.

Benton is a "fine fellow" and if he had been to Charlottesville, then he would be "good people" too.

[Irish_Dem]

3. So how much cheating did this guy do for Rand and McConnell?

[TexasTowelie]

4. It sounds like he had plenty of opportunities to help Rand Paul.

He wasn't with the McConnell campaign for long so there may not have been time to have the same influence.

[Irish_Dem]

5. If your only job is to get a big cash injection from Putin, you don't need to be there long.

[DFW]

9. That could just as easily mean that McTurtle knew that what what this guy was doing was illegal

And he wanted him at legal arm's length just in case he was ever caught and indicted--as in right now.

[jaxexpat]

26. I think you've hit the nail on it's head.

As a young man, McConnell had a secret location where he worshiped and sacrificed his personality to the alter of Henry Clay, the god of "compromise". He changed his religious affiliation in 1988, moving to the Southern Baptists when he realized that Calvinism was just "too nice" and has rarely, since, ever entered a room without first tossing in his hat. High-speed film has caught him actually showing his tiny fangs in a classic defensive posture whenever he meets personally with Nancy Pelosi. His diet consists solely of green apples and baby chicken livers which he claims will maintain his "youthful countenance" longer than his hidden portrait he commissioned 150 years ago. His body temperature is regulated by a modified circadian rhythm (patented) ranging from 78 degrees at noon to 56 degrees at midnight. He has 12 mealy bugs employed to service his coiffure round the clock, claiming their "droppings" keep his hair shiny. They can be seen if one can endure looking for long enough. It's rumored that's why his aides provide "courtesy" bags at all his in-person interviews. He has not made nor can he spell l-o-v-e since an accident in 1949.

[Hugh_Lebowski]

6. "he could arrange for them to meet with a 2016 presidential candidate"

Gosh, I wonder which it would've been?

[gab13by13]

7. I would like to know

who the Russian foreign national is.

[Harker]

8. Doug Weed... author of "George Bush: Man of Integrity." n/t

[Kid Berwyn]

10. Deripaska luvs KY

About time his Senate tools are held to account.

[rickyhall]

11. Moscow Mitch is expert at Anything to Win including more votes than voters.

Is it Russo Rand now?

[rickyhall]

12. Maybe Ruble Rand?

[70sEraVet]

13. Rand Paul is up for re-election in 2022

The DOJ should move fast, so that any dirty money sticks to him like glue!

[Evolve Dammit]

14. Open a broad investigation of all the Russian $ solicitations for all implicated. NRA too.

Maybe DOJ is doing it already. Hopefully. They need to be removed from office if they were accepting money and being influenced by Russia. I'm imagining it goes all the way to the inner reaches of the Orange one's admin.

[AllaN01Bear]

23. love your screen nick.

/revision/latest?cb=20090729102006

[Evolve Dammit]

33. Thanks! I really wish we would

[cstanleytech]

15. Just to be clear the pardon from Trump only applies to crimes he was convicted of correct?

[CaptainTruth]

29. It must. A politician can receive a blanket pardon for all crimes committed...

...while in office, even crimes that weren't known at the time of the pardon, but Benton never held public office so I don't believe the "blanket pardon" applies to him.

[SouthernDem4ever]

36. Congress needs to get rid of blanket pardons

I am so sick of the crooks and liars.

[Fritz Walter]

16. Tip of the iceberg!

Headline from Politico, 8-1-2019:
Ex-McConnell staffers lobbied on Russian-backed Kentucky project

Two former top staffers to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell have lobbied Congress and the Treasury Department on the development of a new Kentucky aluminum mill backed by the Russian aluminum giant Rusal, according to a new lobbying disclosure.

The disclosure comes as Democrats are pushing the Trump administration to review Rusal’s $200 million investment in the Kentucky project — concerned that the mill will supply the Defense Department — and as McConnell weathers criticism for helping block a congressional effort to stop the investment.

The Russian firm was only able to make the investment after it won sanctions relief from penalties the Treasury Department initially imposed in April 2018 on Rusal and other companies owned by Oleg Deripaska, a Russian oligarch and Kremlin ally accused of facilitating Moscow’s nefarious activities, such as seizing land in Ukraine, supplying arms for the Syrian regime and meddling in other countries’ elections.

Fast-forward to March, 2021:
The Russian aluminum company that McConnell personally encouraged to build a plant in Ashland, Kentucky, suspended all of its investments in the project because its U.S. partners have failed to raise the necessary funds for completion of the project. From Publico:

Kentucky pledged $15 million in taxpayer dollars toward the project under former Gov. Matt Bevin, but current Gov. Andy Beshear has repeatedly vowed to get the money back if the mill project doesn’t materialize.

Keep digging, DoJ!

[Corgigal]

28. Cause it was all an

election ploy. Had a build board on the site, and poof it was gone.

[not fooled]

34. Were they using the same construction company

as Scott Wanker for Foxconn in WI?

Potemkin Associates, Ltd.

[link:https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a34417273/foxconn-wisconsin-deal-scott-walker-donald-trump/|]

[calimary]

17. Lock 'em up!

And make ‘em start singing.

[Champp]

18. Republican ethics and morality arise from the bottom of a scuzzbucket

as they demonstrate over and over and over.

[marble falls]

19. When you can't take the game out of the crook, take the crook out of the game: 20 years.

[Farmer-Rick]

20. Soliciting political contributions from foreign nationals is illegal?

Didn't the Robert court make it totally legal in Citizen United?

It sure as hell seems like it. They made corporations people and equated political contributions, money, with political speech. They just about came out and said if you got the money, whoever you are, our politicians have the time for you.

The Supremes have caused Russian interference in our elections. The Roberts court is directly responsible for shorty Putin's attacks on our democracy and they are pleased with themselves.

[AllaN01Bear]

25. that decision needs to be reversed ,but , w the packed court , aint going to happenn

[Historic NY]

21. Can we audit the election returns...

I want to see the flop sweat on Mitch's neck

[AllaN01Bear]

24. hear hear.

[AllaN01Bear]

22. when are the prosocutors going to go after the big cheese instead of the little fish?

[DFW]

27. Pretty soon, it won't be "Rand Paul" any more

At his trial, he will be addressed formally as "Rand Pavel."

[SunSeeker]

30. Moscow Mitch ain't called Moscow Mitch for nothing!

Mitch, Rand and TFG are Russian assets.

[BlueIdaho]

31. Highly placed Republican operatives funnel Russian money into campaigns

A headline that surprises absolutely no one.

[stillcool]

32. I'm surprised the two need any help

although I guess everyone needs a go-between for plausible deniability.
3,692

Link to tweet

RAND PAUL IS TRUMP’S PERFECT RUSSIA STOOGE
The Senate’s resident wacko bird finds a new political family that shares his curious affinity for Moscow.

BY TINA NGUYEN

AUGUST 7, 2018

On Monday, weeks after Paul made an impassioned speech on the Senate floor in support of Trump’s Helsinki summit—“The hatred for the president is so intense that partisans would rather risk war than give diplomacy a chance”—the Kentucky senator visited Moscow on a private trip to strengthen relations between Russia and the U.S., a matter he called “in­cred­ibly important,” to The Washington Post. (The U.S. Embassy in Moscow told the Post that Paul was not on an official diplomatic trip, and was traveling privately with a group.) Paul’s Russian jaunt reportedly included a visit with former Russian ambassador to the U.S. Sergey Kislyak, who U.S. intelligence suggests is a spy, and whose undisclosed meetings with Jeff Sessions and Michael Flynn led indirectly to Robert Mueller’s probe into the Trump campaign.

At the tour’s conclusion, Paul released a statement saying he was “pleased” to announce that the contact with Russia would continue: “We agreed and we invited members of the Foreign Affairs Committee of Russia to come to the U.S. to meet with us in the U.S., in Washington,” he said. For their part, Russian politicians reportedly have a laundry list of topics to discuss with Paul, including nonproliferation, sanctions, and alleged Russian spy Maria Butina. According to Russian media, State Duma foreign-affairs committee head Leonid Slutsky asked Paul about Butina’s “early release,” adding, “We hope and expect that our colleagues will conduct the necessary consultations with Washington, and tomorrow we can consult about a road map and the plan of actions [on Butina’s case].”
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2018/08/rand-paul-donald-trump-perfect-russia-stooge

[AZProgressive]

35. Charles Booker

Link to tweet

[Red Mountain]

37. Money in politics

has to be reigned in. Voting rights and this.

If we want a Democracy.

[Grins]

38. And, of course it is a Russian national.

Who didn’t immediately guess that?