Mueller investigating Ivanka and Donald Trump Jr.’s role in planning Trump Tower Moscow: report

Special counsel Robert Mueller is looking into Ivanka and Donald Trump Jr.’s role in seeking to build a Trump Tower skyscraper in Moscow three years before their father’s presidential campaign, sources told Yahoo News in an investigation published Thursday. 

The president’s elder daughter, now-White House adviser Ivanka, and his eldest son Don Jr. reportedly worked to build Trump Tower Moscow for several years, ending their efforts in 2013, sources told Yahoo News.

{mosads}“They were not looking at any other deals after that,” a source told the news publication.

The news of Ivanka and Don. Jr’s involvement in a possible Trump building in Russia deal comes the same day the president’s former lawyer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty in court for misstatements he made to Congress while testifying about the effort to build a Trump Tower in Moscow during the 2016 presidential campaign. 

Mueller’s charging documents against Cohen mentioned that Trump’s former fixer lied about having “briefed [Trump] family members” who worked at the Trump Organization about the possible Moscow project. Ivanka was an executive with the organization before she became a White House adviser and Trump’s son is still an executive there.

Trump’s children’s efforts to secure the Trump Tower deal were separate from Cohen’s, Yahoo News reported. Ivanka and Don Jr. reportedly knew about Cohen’s efforts in 2016. 

“Michael was looking at that deal,” the source told Yahoo. “Don and Ivanka knew about it and Don testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee that he was peripherally aware of it. “

“That’s why we’re so perplexed Cohen would lie about briefing them because no one’s ever disputed that they knew he was looking at it,” the source added.

Don Jr. and an attorney for Ivanka declined to comment for the story.

Trump’s business endeavors with Russians have played a role in the special counsel’s probe into possible ties between Russia and the Trump campaign. The president was a businessman and real estate mogul for years before he launched a a bid for president, and during that time, he had contacts with Russian businesspeople.