Roles of Trump Fundraiser, Kushner’s Attorney Were Scrutinized in Pardon Bribe Probe
A former Trump fundraiser and a prominent lawyer were among the people scrutinized by the Justice Department for their roles in what a judge described as a possible bribery scheme to win a presidential pardon for a…
A former Trump fundraiser and a prominent lawyer were among the people scrutinized by the Justice Department for their roles in what a judge described as a possible bribery scheme to win a presidential pardon for a convicted felon, lawyers for the men said Thursday.
Lawyer Abbe Lowell’s attorney and friend Reid Weingarten said his client was never a target or subject in the Justice Department’s inquiry, while former fundraiser Elliot Broidy’s attorney William Burck said his client was “not under investigation and has not been accused by anyone of any wrongdoing whatsoever.”
No one has been charged in the investigation, the status of which is unclear.
The New York Times first reported Lowell and Broidy’s roles in the case on Thursday evening.
A federal judge on Tuesday released a heavily redacted document which revealed that the Justice Department had obtained possible evidence of a bribery scheme in which someone “would offer a substantial political contribution in exchange for a presidential pardon or reprieve of sentence.”
The court documents did not disclose details of the alleged crime or the identities of those involved.
The Justice Department had to ask the judge’s permission to view certain emails between a lawyer and clients. The judge granted the request in August, finding attorney-client privilege did not apply.
At the time, U.S. President Donald Trump described the investigation as “Fake News!” on Twitter.
The New York Times reported that the efforts to secure clemency were focused on a Berkeley, California-based psychologist, Hugh Baras, who was convicted in 2014 of tax evasion and improperly claiming Social Security benefits.
As part of the plan, a San Francisco real estate developer, Sanford Diller, would make an unspecified political contribution, it added. Diller died in 2018.
In October – several months after the Justice Department won the request to review the emails in the pardon bribery inquiry, Broidy pleaded guilty in a separate case to illegally lobbying Trump to drop an investigation into a Malaysian embezzlement scandal.