Corey Lewandowski: Color me shocked Congress, media ignore Clinton’s Russia scandal

There is an evolving story showing Russia’s involvement in influence peddling in American politics that has been largely ignored by the mainstream media, including staggering allegations that Hillary Clinton was a target of an influence campaign.

This is big news, yet the media seems to be all consumed by a campaign to knock down President Donald J. Trump. A fair and balanced analysis would have the cable news talking heads spending a week dissecting the recent reports about Hillary Clinton’s tenure as secretary of State and the actions by President Obama’s Justice Department to respond to alleged Russian efforts to influence and target the Clintons.

{mosads}This is a big scandal and it is clear that Congress should hold hearings on these new allegations to get to the bottom of what actions the Obama Justice Department took to stop Russian attempts to get favorable treatment.

What should be the leading news this week involves an investigation of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) into the way agents of Russia were using allegedly illegal means to influence President Obama’s Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in 2009 and 2010.  John Solomon and Alison Spann of The Hill reported over the weekend:

“As Hillary Clinton was beginning her job as President Obama’s chief diplomat, federal agents observed as multiple arms of Vladimir Putin’s machine unleashed an influence campaign designed to win access to the new secretary of State, her husband Bill Clinton and members of their inner circle, according to interviews and once-sealed FBI records.”

There are allegations of a mix of legal and illegal activity on the part of Russians: that a female Russian spy secured employment with a major Democratic donor (illegal) and a subsidiary of Russia’s state-controlled nuclear energy company hired a D.C. firm to lobby the Obama administration (legal).

#BREAKING: FBI discovered Russian spies attempting to get close to Clinton while she was Secretary of State https://t.co/uTLJrxRCOW pic.twitter.com/SzaPvazhC8

— The Hill (@thehill) October 22, 2017

The most striking revelation was “agents were surprised by the timing and size of a $500,000 check that a Kremlin-linked bank provided Bill Clinton with for a single speech in the summer of 2010. The payday came just weeks after Hillary Clinton helped arrange for American executives to travel to Moscow to support Putin’s efforts to build his own country’s version of Silicon Valley, agents said.”  

Although the report indicates that the FBI did not see any smoking gun of illegal activity on the part of the Clintons, this report should spur a Congressional investigation to get to the bottom of Russian interference in American politics.

On October 17, 2017, The Hill reported on a separate scandal that the “FBI uncovered Russian bribery plot before Obama administration approved controversial nuclear deal with Moscow.”  

This report alleged that:

“Before the Obama administration approved a controversial deal in 2010 giving Moscow control of a large swath of American uranium, the FBI had gathered substantial evidence that Russian nuclear industry officials were engaged in bribery, kickbacks, extortion and money laundering designed to grow Vladimir Putin’s atomic energy business inside the United States, according to government documents and interviews.”

The FBI had a source and documents that indicated “Russian nuclear officials had routed millions of dollars to the U.S. designed to benefit former President Bill Clinton’s charitable foundation during the time Secretary of State Hillary Clinton served on a government body that provided a favorable decision to Moscow.” Again, one would think that Congress would take these allegations more seriously than the Obama controlled Justice Department that never made the 2010 charges public. These allegations are now public and need to be investigated.

FBI uncovered Russian bribery plot before Obama administration approved controversial nuclear deal with Moscow: https://t.co/8RHJaOGImk pic.twitter.com/oMOne65ouH

— The Hill (@thehill) October 17, 2017

Congress has a constitutional duty to conduct oversight investigations. Right now, there are investigations open in Congress from the Senate Intelligence Committee, Senate Judiciary Committee, House Intelligence Committee and the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. They are investigating Russia’s involvement in the 2016 election, yet they have the oversight authority to broaden that mandate into the activities of Russia that stretch back into the Obama administration.

There is also a Special Counsel housed at the Justice Department to conduct a similar investigation and nothing prevents the special counsel from also investigating this emerging and developing scandal.  This is the real Russia story, not a story about made up collusion between Russian agents and the Trump campaign.

Clinton pushes back on Russian uranium deal reports: “Baloney” https://t.co/oxFNemsig4 pic.twitter.com/6Y6bKMdsPI

— The Hill (@thehill) October 23, 2017

Ironically, while the mainstream media is moving away from a possible direct connection between candidate Donald Trump and Russia to influence the last presidential election, they seem to be largely ignoring these revelations of a potential cover-up during the Obama administration. The big story should be uranium and the Bill Clinton half-million dollar pay out.

This is one of the biggest stories of the last 10 years, yet don’t expect the mainstream media to actually follow this story to the end without Congress stepping up to the plate and conducting public hearings on this matter. Both Congress and the media need to chase down the facts about this emerging scandal so the American people can fully understand a Russian conspiracy to influence Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and if it was successful.

Corey Lewandowski served as a campaign manager to Donald J. Trump, the 45th president of the United States. He is senior advisor and a spokesman for America First Action. Follow him on Twitter @CLewandowski_.