GiveEmElle 1,559 Posted July 23, 2018 Share Posted July 23, 2018 1 hour ago, AUFAN78 said: ODL. No, I am not concerned Elle and unhinged rants from the left will not change that. You should be. But I guess that would make you uncomfortable to admit you support such an atrocious president. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AUFAN78 3,911 Posted July 23, 2018 Share Posted July 23, 2018 27 minutes ago, GiveEmElle said: You should be. But I guess that would make you uncomfortable to admit you support such an atrocious president. No, I should not be. I choose to ignore manufactured outrage. You'd be much happier if you did the same. I sincerely hope you'll consider the advice. I have no problem admitting I support the POTUS. I've supported every single POTUS in my lifetime. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Proud Tiger 4,261 Posted July 23, 2018 Share Posted July 23, 2018 20 hours ago, GiveEmElle said: Putin was alone? You sure about that? You can say the left is grasping at straws if you wish but Trump was ill prepared for this meeting. He stupidly went in alone with no prepared talking points or messaging. Then he sided with Putin over his own intelligence agencies. That action alone is unprecedented. And the WHbis still silent on what happened at summit while the Russian Propoganda machine is churning out stories to make Russia appear on equal footing with the US. Are you sure he wasn't? lots of unproven speculation here. No indication the ambassador was in the private meeting so he is just doing talking points.....unless you know something the rest of us don't. I'm open to facts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mikey 16,614 Posted July 23, 2018 Share Posted July 23, 2018 22 hours ago, GiveEmElle said: Putin was alone? You sure about that? After further reflection: Is it possible that you were commenting on something you hadn't even been aware of? For days it's been widely stated that the two leaders and one interpreter for each would be the only four people present in this meeting. You didn't know that? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aubiefifty 16,803 Posted July 23, 2018 Share Posted July 23, 2018 On 7/20/2018 at 5:59 PM, NolaAuTiger said: Hopefully he won’t sell them any ownership interest in Uranium, you know the stuff that can be used in Nuclear Weapons? Can you imagine if someone were to do that? lets try some real facts nola. what do ya say? you got your goobers gushing over your response except for one thing. it is a lie....... factcheck.org The Facts on Uranium One 12-15 minutes Two House committees have said that they will investigate the Obama administration’s approval of a deal that gave Russia a financial interest in U.S. uranium production. The 2010 deal allowed Rosatom, the Russian nuclear energy agency, to acquire a controlling stake in Uranium One, a Canadian-based company with mining stakes in the Western United States. We covered it during the 2016 presidential campaign, when Donald Trump falsely accused former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton of giving away U.S. uranium rights to the Russians and claimed — without evidence — that it was done in exchange for donations to the Clinton Foundation. Now, the issue is back in the news, and numerous readers have asked us about it again. So we will recap here what we know — and don’t know — about the 2010 deal. The Deal On June 8, 2010, Uranium One announced it had signed an agreement that would give “not less than 51%” of the company to JSC Atomredmetzoloto, or ARMZ, the mining arm of Rosatom, the Russian nuclear energy agency. At the time, Uranium One’s two licensed mining operations in Wyoming amounted to about “20 percent of the currently licensed uranium in-situ recovery production capacity in the U.S.,” according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. In-situ recovery is the extraction method currently used by 10 of the 11 licensed U.S. uranium producers. Uranium One also has exploration projects in Arizona, Colorado and Utah. But the deal required multiple approvals by the U.S., beginning with the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States. Under federal law, the committee reviews foreign investments that raise potential national security concerns. The Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States The Committee on Foreign Investments has nine members, including the secretaries of the treasury, state, defense, homeland security, commerce and energy; the attorney general; and representatives from two White House offices (the United States Trade Representative and the Office of Science and Technology Policy). The committee can’t actually stop a sale from going through — it can only approve a sale. The president is the only one who can stop a sale, if the committee or any one member “recommends suspension or prohibition of the transaction,” according to guidelines issued by the Treasury Department in December 2008 after the department adopted its final rule a month earlier. For this and other reasons, we have written that Trump is wrong to claim that Clinton “gave away 20 percent of the uranium in the United States” to Russia. Clinton could have objected — as could the eight other voting members — but that objection alone wouldn’t have stopped the sale of the stake of Uranium One to Rosatom. “Only the President has the authority to suspend or prohibit a covered transaction,” the federal guidelines say. We don’t know much about the committee’s deliberations because there are “strong confidentiality requirements” prohibiting disclosure of information filed with the committee, the Treasury Department says on its website. Some information would have become available if the committee or any one of its members objected to the sale. But none of the nine members objected. “When a transaction is referred to the President, however, the decision of the President is announced publicly,” Treasury says. We don’t even know if Clinton was involved in the committee’s review and approval of the uranium deal. Jose Fernandez, a former assistant secretary of state, told the New York Times that he represented the department on the committee. “Mrs. Clinton never intervened with me on any C.F.I.U.S. matter,” he told the Times, referring to the committee by its acronym. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission It is also important to note that other federal approvals were needed to complete the deal, and even still more approvals would be needed to export the uranium. First, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission had to approve the transfer of two uranium recovery licenses in Wyoming from Uranium One to the Russian company. The NRC announced it approved the transfer on Nov. 24, 2010. But, as the NRC explained at the time, “no uranium produced at either facility may be exported.” As NRC explained in a March 2011 letter to Republican Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming, the Russian company would have to apply for and obtain an export license and “commit to use the material only for peaceful purposes” in accordance with “the U.S.-Russia Atomic Energy Act Section 123 agreement for peaceful nuclear cooperation.” In a June 2015 letter to Rep. Peter Visclosky, the NRC said it granted RSB Logistics Services an amendment to its export license in 2012 to allow the Kentucky shipping company to export uranium to Canada from various sources — including from a Uranium One site in Wyoming. The NRC said that the export license allowed RSB to ship uranium to a conversion plant in Canada and then back to the United States for further processing. Canada must obtain U.S. approval to transfer any U.S. uranium to any country other than the United States, the letter says. “Please be assured that no Uranium One, Inc.-produced uranium has been shipped directly to Russia and the U.S. Government has not authorized any country to re-transfer U.S. uranium to Russia,” the 2015 letter said. “That 2015 statement remains true today,” David McIntyre, a spokesman for the NRC, told us in an email. RSB Logistics’ current export license, which expires in December, still lists Uranium One as one of its suppliers of uranium. Uranium One, which is now wholly-owned subsidiary of Rosatom, sells uranium to civilian power reactors in the United States, according to the Energy Information Administration. But U.S. owners and operators of commercial nuclear reactors purchase the vast majority of their uranium from foreign sources. Only 11 percent of the 50.6 million pounds purchased in 2016 came from U.S. domestic producers, according to the EIA. Although Uranium One once held 20 percent of licensed uranium in-situ recovery production capacity in the U.S., that’s no longer the case. There were only four in-situ recovery facilities licensed by the NRC in 2010. Currently, there are 10 such facilities, so Uranium One’s mining operations now account for an estimated 10 percent of in-situ recovery production capacity in the U.S., the NRC told us in an email. As for production, the company was responsible for only about 11 percent of U.S. uranium production in 2014, according to 2015 congressional testimony by a Department of Energy contractor. More recently, Uranium One has been responsible for no more than 5.9 percent of domestic production, according to a September 2017 report by the U.S. International Trade Commission. Clinton Foundation Donations and Bill Clinton Speaking Fee Clinton’s role in the Uranium One sale, and the link to the Clinton Foundation, first became an issue in 2015, when news organizations received advance copies of the book “Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich,” by Peter Schweizer, a former fellow at a conservative think tank. On April 23, 2015, the New York Times wrote about the uranium issue, saying the paper had “built upon” Schweizer’s information. The Times detailed how the Clinton Foundation had received millions in donations from investors in Uranium One. The donations from those with ties to Uranium One weren’t publicly disclosed by the Clinton Foundation, even though Hillary Clinton had an agreement with the White House that the foundation would disclose all contributors. Days after the Times story, the foundation acknowledged that it “made mistakes,” saying it had disclosed donations from a Canadian charity, for instance, but not the donors to that charity who were associated with the uranium company. The Times also wrote that Bill Clinton spoke at a conference in Moscow on June 29, 2010 — which was after the Rosatom-Uranium One merger was announced in June 2010, but before it was approved by the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States in October 2010. The Russian-based Renaissance Capital Group organized the conference and paid Clinton $500,000. Renaissance Capital has “ties to the Kremlin” and its analysts “talked up Uranium One’s stock, assigning it a ‘buy’ rating and saying in a July 2010 research report that it was ‘the best play’ in the uranium markets,” the Times wrote. But there is no evidence that the donations or the speaking fee had any influence on the approvals granted by the NRC or the Committee on Foreign Investments. Back in the News This arcane bit of campaign trivia resurfaced in the news after The Hill, a Capitol Hill newspaper, reported that a Russian spy sought to gain access to Hillary Clinton when she was secretary of state. Lydia Guryev, who used the name “Cynthia Murphy” while living in the United States, pleaded guilty to espionage charges in July 2010 and was forced to leave the U.S. Her guilty plea came after the Rosatom-Uranium One merger was announced and before the Committee on Foreign Investments approved it. But there was nothing about the merger in the federal criminal complaint or the press release announcing her guilty plea. The criminal complaint said that Guryev had been working as a spy in the United States since the 1990s and took orders from the foreign intelligence organ of the Russian Federation in Moscow. For example, Guryev was ordered in the spring of 2009, in advance of Obama’s upcoming trip to Russia, to get information on “Obama’s goals which he expects to achieve during the summit [with Russia] in July,” the complaint said. The only reference in the criminal complaint to Clinton was a veiled one. Federal agents said Guryev sought to get close with “a personal friend of [a current Cabinet official, name omitted].” The Hill identified the cabinet official as Clinton. The Hill story also rehashed an FBI investigation that resulted in “charges against the Russian nuclear industry’s point man in the United States, TENEX director Vadim Mikerin, as well as a Russian financier and an American trucking executive whose company moved Russian uranium around the United States.” In 2015, Mikerin was sentenced to 48 months and required to pay more than $2 million in restitution for conspiring to commit money laundering, according to the Justice Department. The Hill quoted the attorney for a former FBI informant in the TENEX case as saying her client “witnessed numerous, detailed conversations in which Russian actors described their efforts to lobby, influence or ingratiate themselves with the Clintons in hopes of winning favorable uranium decisions from the Obama administration.” The convictions of Guryev and Mikerin are not new, and there’s no evidence that either case has any connection to the Rosatom-Uranium One merger. Nevertheless, the article has prompted the Republican chairmen of the House intelligence and oversight committees to announce a joint investigation of the merger. On Fox News, Rep. Devin Nunes, the chairman of the House intelligence committee, said that “we’ve been communicating back and forth through different channels” with the FBI informant in the TENEX case. “You are talking about major decisions that were made at a time when we were resetting relations with Russia that actually happened to benefit, you know, the Clinton Foundation, perhaps other avenues, we don’t know yet,” Nunes said in an Oct. 24 interview with Bret Baier. It may be that individuals and companies sought to curry favor with Hillary Clinton and even influence her department’s decision on the Uranium One sale. But, as we’ve written before, there is no evidence that donations to the Clinton Foundation from people with ties to Uranium One or Bill Clinton’s speaking fee influenced Hillary Clinton’s official actions. That’s still the case. We will update this article with any major developments. Update, Nov. 1: This story has been updated to say that NRC now estimates that Uranium One’s mining operations account for about 10 percent of in-situ recovery production capacity in the U.S. That’s half of what it was in 2010, because more in-situ recovery mining operators have been licensed since 2010. We also added that Uranium One is responsible for no more than 5.9 percent of domestic production, according to a September 2017 report by the U.S. International Trade Commission. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Two House committees have said that they will investigate the Obama administration’s approval of a deal that gave Russia a financial interest in U.S. uranium production. The 2010 deal allowed Rosatom, the Russian nuclear energy agency, to acquire a controlling stake in Uranium One, a Canadian-based company with mining stakes in the Western United States. We covered it during the 2016 presidential campaign, when Donald Trump falsely accused former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton of giving away U.S. uranium rights to the Russians and claimed — without evidence — that it was done in exchange for donations to the Clinton Foundation. Now, the issue is back in the news, and numerous readers have asked us about it again. So we will recap here what we know — and don’t know — about the 2010 deal. The Deal On June 8, 2010, Uranium One announced it had signed an agreement that would give “not less than 51%” of the company to JSC Atomredmetzoloto, or ARMZ, the mining arm of Rosatom, the Russian nuclear energy agency. At the time, Uranium One’s two licensed mining operations in Wyoming amounted to about “20 percent of the currently licensed uranium in-situ recovery production capacity in the U.S.,” according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. In-situ recovery is the extraction method currently used by 10 of the 11 licensed U.S. uranium producers. Uranium One also has exploration projects in Arizona, Colorado and Utah. But the deal required multiple approvals by the U.S., beginning with the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States. Under federal law, the committee reviews foreign investments that raise potential national security concerns. The Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States The Committee on Foreign Investments has nine members, including the secretaries of the treasury, state, defense, homeland security, commerce and energy; the attorney general; and representatives from two White House offices (the United States Trade Representative and the Office of Science and Technology Policy). The committee can’t actually stop a sale from going through — it can only approve a sale. The president is the only one who can stop a sale, if the committee or any one member “recommends suspension or prohibition of the transaction,” according to guidelines issued by the Treasury Department in December 2008 after the department adopted its final rule a month earlier. For this and other reasons, we have written that Trump is wrong to claim that Clinton “gave away 20 percent of the uranium in the United States” to Russia. Clinton could have objected — as could the eight other voting members — but that objection alone wouldn’t have stopped the sale of the stake of Uranium One to Rosatom. “Only the President has the authority to suspend or prohibit a covered transaction,” the federal guidelines say. We don’t know much about the committee’s deliberations because there are “strong confidentiality requirements” prohibiting disclosure of information filed with the committee, the Treasury Department says on its website. Some information would have become available if the committee or any one of its members objected to the sale. But none of the nine members objected. “When a transaction is referred to the President, however, the decision of the President is announced publicly,” Treasury says. We don’t even know if Clinton was involved in the committee’s review and approval of the uranium deal. Jose Fernandez, a former assistant secretary of state, told the New York Times that he represented the department on the committee. “Mrs. Clinton never intervened with me on any C.F.I.U.S. matter,” he told the Times, referring to the committee by its acronym. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission It is also important to note that other federal approvals were needed to complete the deal, and even still more approvals would be needed to export the uranium. First, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission had to approve the transfer of two uranium recovery licenses in Wyoming from Uranium One to the Russian company. The NRC announced it approved the transfer on Nov. 24, 2010. But, as the NRC explained at the time, “no uranium produced at either facility may be exported.” As NRC explained in a March 2011 letter to Republican Sen. John Barrasso of Wyoming, the Russian company would have to apply for and obtain an export license and “commit to use the material only for peaceful purposes” in accordance with “the U.S.-Russia Atomic Energy Act Section 123 agreement for peaceful nuclear cooperation.” In a June 2015 letter to Rep. Peter Visclosky, the NRC said it granted RSB Logistics Services an amendment to its export license in 2012 to allow the Kentucky shipping company to export uranium to Canada from various sources — including from a Uranium One site in Wyoming. The NRC said that the export license allowed RSB to ship uranium to a conversion plant in Canada and then back to the United States for further processing. Canada must obtain U.S. approval to transfer any U.S. uranium to any country other than the United States, the letter says. “Please be assured that no Uranium One, Inc.-produced uranium has been shipped directly to Russia and the U.S. Government has not authorized any country to re-transfer U.S. uranium to Russia,” the 2015 letter said. “That 2015 statement remains true today,” David McIntyre, a spokesman for the NRC, told us in an email. RSB Logistics’ current export license, which expires in December, still lists Uranium One as one of its suppliers of uranium. Uranium One, which is now wholly-owned subsidiary of Rosatom, sells uranium to civilian power reactors in the United States, according to the Energy Information Administration. But U.S. owners and operators of commercial nuclear reactors purchase the vast majority of their uranium from foreign sources. Only 11 percent of the 50.6 million pounds purchased in 2016 came from U.S. domestic producers, according to the EIA. Although Uranium One once held 20 percent of licensed uranium in-situ recovery production capacity in the U.S., that’s no longer the case. There were only four in-situ recovery facilities licensed by the NRC in 2010. Currently, there are 10 such facilities, so Uranium One’s mining operations now account for an estimated 10 percent of in-situ recovery production capacity in the U.S., the NRC told us in an email. As for production, the company was responsible for only about 11 percent of U.S. uranium production in 2014, according to 2015 congressional testimony by a Department of Energy contractor. More recently, Uranium One has been responsible for no more than 5.9 percent of domestic production, according to a September 2017 report by the U.S. International Trade Commission. Clinton Foundation Donations and Bill Clinton Speaking Fee Clinton’s role in the Uranium One sale, and the link to the Clinton Foundation, first became an issue in 2015, when news organizations received advance copies of the book “Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich,” by Peter Schweizer, a former fellow at a conservative think tank. On April 23, 2015, the New York Times wrote about the uranium issue, saying the paper had “built upon” Schweizer’s information. The Times detailed how the Clinton Foundation had received millions in donations from investors in Uranium One. The donations from those with ties to Uranium One weren’t publicly disclosed by the Clinton Foundation, even though Hillary Clinton had an agreement with the White House that the foundation would disclose all contributors. Days after the Times story, the foundation acknowledged that it “made mistakes,” saying it had disclosed donations from a Canadian charity, for instance, but not the donors to that charity who were associated with the uranium company. The Times also wrote that Bill Clinton spoke at a conference in Moscow on June 29, 2010 — which was after the Rosatom-Uranium One merger was announced in June 2010, but before it was approved by the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States in October 2010. The Russian-based Renaissance Capital Group organized the conference and paid Clinton $500,000. Renaissance Capital has “ties to the Kremlin” and its analysts “talked up Uranium One’s stock, assigning it a ‘buy’ rating and saying in a July 2010 research report that it was ‘the best play’ in the uranium markets,” the Times wrote. But there is no evidence that the donations or the speaking fee had any influence on the approvals granted by the NRC or the Committee on Foreign Investments. Back in the News This arcane bit of campaign trivia resurfaced in the news after The Hill, a Capitol Hill newspaper, reported that a Russian spy sought to gain access to Hillary Clinton when she was secretary of state. Lydia Guryev, who used the name “Cynthia Murphy” while living in the United States, pleaded guilty to espionage charges in July 2010 and was forced to leave the U.S. Her guilty plea came after the Rosatom-Uranium One merger was announced and before the Committee on Foreign Investments approved it. But there was nothing about the merger in the federal criminal complaint or the press release announcing her guilty plea. The criminal complaint said that Guryev had been working as a spy in the United States since the 1990s and took orders from the foreign intelligence organ of the Russian Federation in Moscow. For example, Guryev was ordered in the spring of 2009, in advance of Obama’s upcoming trip to Russia, to get information on “Obama’s goals which he expects to achieve during the summit [with Russia] in July,” the complaint said. The only reference in the criminal complaint to Clinton was a veiled one. Federal agents said Guryev sought to get close with “a personal friend of [a current Cabinet official, name omitted].” The Hill identified the cabinet official as Clinton. The Hill story also rehashed an FBI investigation that resulted in “charges against the Russian nuclear industry’s point man in the United States, TENEX director Vadim Mikerin, as well as a Russian financier and an American trucking executive whose company moved Russian uranium around the United States.” In 2015, Mikerin was sentenced to 48 months and required to pay more than $2 million in restitution for conspiring to commit money laundering, according to the Justice Department. The Hill quoted the attorney for a former FBI informant in the TENEX case as saying her client “witnessed numerous, detailed conversations in which Russian actors described their efforts to lobby, influence or ingratiate themselves with the Clintons in hopes of winning favorable uranium decisions from the Obama administration.” The convictions of Guryev and Mikerin are not new, and there’s no evidence that either case has any connection to the Rosatom-Uranium One merger. Nevertheless, the article has prompted the Republican chairmen of the House intelligence and oversight committees to announce a joint investigation of the merger. On Fox News, Rep. Devin Nunes, the chairman of the House intelligence committee, said that “we’ve been communicating back and forth through different channels” with the FBI informant in the TENEX case. “You are talking about major decisions that were made at a time when we were resetting relations with Russia that actually happened to benefit, you know, the Clinton Foundation, perhaps other avenues, we don’t know yet,” Nunes said in an Oct. 24 interview with Bret Baier. It may be that individuals and companies sought to curry favor with Hillary Clinton and even influence her department’s decision on the Uranium One sale. But, as we’ve written before, there is no evidence that donations to the Clinton Foundation from people with ties to Uranium One or Bill Clinton’s speaking fee influenced Hillary Clinton’s official actions. That’s still the case. We will update this article with any major developments. Update, Nov. 1: This story has been updated to say that NRC now estimates that Uranium One’s mining operations account for about 10 percent of in-situ recovery production capacity in the U.S. That’s half of what it was in 2010, because more in-situ recovery mining operators have been licensed since 2010. We also added that Uranium One is responsible for no more than 5.9 percent of domestic production, according to a September 2017 report by the U.S. International Trade Commission.
aubiefifty 16,803 Posted July 23, 2018 Share Posted July 23, 2018 On 7/20/2018 at 5:59 PM, NolaAuTiger said: Hopefully he won’t sell them any ownership interest in Uranium, you know the stuff that can be used in Nuclear Weapons? Can you imagine if someone were to do that? snopes.com Hillary Clinton Gave 20 Percent of United States' Uranium to Russia in Exchange for Clinton Foundation Donations? Fact Checker: David Emery 12-16 minutes CLAIM Sec. of State Hillary Clinton's approval of a deal to transfer control of 20% of U.S. uranium deposits to a Russian company was a quid pro quo exchange for donations to the Clinton Foundation. See Example( s ) EXAMPLES Collected via e-mail, 2016 January 2016: This was on Facebook: "As Secretary of State, Hilary transferred half of U.S. uranium to Russia and received $145 million donation to Clinton Foundation." March 2016: This is posted on Facebook. "Secretary of State Hillary Clinton transferred 20% of US uranium to Putin's Russia as 9 investors in the deal funneled $145 million to the Clinton Foundation." Is this a true fact? Thanks. RATING ORIGIN In the months leading up to the 2016 United States presidential election, stories abounded about the relationships between the Clinton Foundation and various foreign entities. May 2015 saw the publication of a book called Clinton Cash: The Untold Story of How and Why Foreign Governments and Businesses Helped Make Bill and Hillary Rich, an exposé of alleged Clinton Foundation corruption written by Peter Schweizer, a former Hoover Institution fellow and editor-at-large at the right-wing media company Breitbart. A chapter in the book suggests that the Clinton family and Russia each may have benefited from a “pay-for-play” scheme while Hillary Clinton was secretary of state, involving the transfer of U.S. uranium reserves to the new Russian owners of an international mining operation in exchange for $145 million in donations to the Clinton Foundation. The mining company, Uranium One, was originally based in South Africa, but merged in 2007 with Canada-based UrAsia Energy. Shareholders there retained a controlling interest until 2010, when Russia’s nuclear agency, Rosatom, completed purchase of a 51% stake. Hillary Clinton played a part in the transaction insofar as it involved the transfer of ownership of a material deemed important to national security — uranium, amounting to one-fifth of U.S. reserves (a fraction re-estimated by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) at closer to one-tenth of the United States’ uranium production capacity in 2017) — thus requiring the approval of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), on which the U.S. Secretary of State sits. During the same time frame that the acquisition took place, the Clinton Foundation accepted contributions from nine individuals associated with Uranium One totaling more than $100 million, Schweizer claimed in Clinton Cash. Among those who followed Schweizer in citing the transaction as an instance of alleged Clinton corruption was GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, who said during a June 2016 speech in New York City: Hillary Clinton’s State Department approved the transfer of 20% of America’s uranium holdings to Russia, while nine investors in the deal funneled $145 million to the Clinton Foundation. Trump’s campaign repeated the allegation in a September 2016 press release, and again in an October 2016 television ad stating that Clinton “gave American uranium rights to the Russians”: An image circulating via social media during the final months of the presidential campaign asked the question, “So Hillary, if Russia is such a threat, why did you sell them 20% of our uranium? Are you a liar, or a traitor, or both?” The Uranium One Deal Was Not Clinton’s to Veto or Approve Among the ways these accusations stray from the facts is in attributing a power of veto or approval to Secretary Clinton that she simply did not have. Clinton was one of nine cabinet members and department heads that sit on the CFIUS, and the secretary of the treasury is its chairperson. CFIUS members are collectively charged with evaluating proposed foreign acquisitions for potential national security issues, then turning their findings over to the president. By law, the committee can’t veto a transaction; only the president can. All nine federal agencies were required to approve the Uranium One transaction before it could go forward. According to The New York Times, Clinton may not have even directly participated in the decision. Then-Assistant Secretary of State Jose Fernandez, whose job it was to represent the State Dept. on CFIUS, said Clinton “never intervened” in committee matters. Clinton herself has said she wasn’t personally involved. There Is No Evidence That Uranium Went to Russia That a change of company ownership occurred doesn’t mean that 10 to 20 percent of America’s uranium literally went to Russia. Neither Uranium One nor ARMZ (Rosatom’s mining subsidiary) is licensed to export uranium from the U.S. to other countries. Some exports did occur, however. A 2015 letter from NRC official Mark Satorius to a member of Congress revealed that an unspecified amount of yellowcake (semi-processed) uranium was shipped from a Uranium One facility in Wyoming to Canada between 2012 and 2014 for conversion (additional processing to prepare it for enrichment). A portion of that uranium was subsequently shipped to enrichment plants in Europe. The transfers to Canada were legal despite Uranium One’s not holding an export license because the NRC granted such a license to the company that transported it. The transfers to Europe were legal because they were approved by another agency, the U.S. Dept. of Energy. Satorius stressed that the transfers were subject to NRC oversight and all applicable safety and national security regulations: Before issuing this license amendment to RSB Logistics Services — or any other export license or license amendment — the NRC must determine that the proposed export is not inimical to the common defense and security of the United States. Under existing NRC regulations, this means that any uranium proposed to be exported to any country for use in nuclear fuel would be subject to the Atomic Energy Act Section 123 agreement for peaceful nuclear cooperation between the U.S. and that other country and confirmed in case-specific, government-to government assurances for each export license. The receiving country is required to commit to use the material only for peaceful purposes (not for development of any nuclear explosive device), to maintain adequate physical protection, and not to retransfer the material to a third country or alter it in form or content without the prior consent of the U.S. The transfer of the U.S.-supplied uranium from Canada to Europe noted above also was subject to applicable Section 123 agreements. Additionally, a small amount of that exported uranium was, in fact, sold to other countries. According to a 2 November 2017 article in The Hill, Uranium One officials acknowledged that approximately 25 percent of the yellowcake exported for conversion was subsequently sold via “book transfer” to customers in Western Europe and Asia (yellowcake being a fungible commodity, that doesn’t necessarily translate to a physical transfer of the product, however). To date, there is no evidence that any of this uranium made its way to Russia. An NRC spokesman cited by FactCheck.org in October 2017 reaffirmed Satorius’s assurances that “the U.S. government has not authorized any country to re-transfer U.S. uranium to Russia.” NRC officials also say they’re unaware of any Uranium One exports from the U.S. to foreign countries since 2014. The Timing of Most of the Clinton Foundation Donations Does Not Match Of the $145 million allegedly contributed to the Clinton Foundation by Uranium One investors, the lion’s share — $131.3 million — came from a single donor, Frank Giustra, the company’s Canadian founder. But Giustra sold off his entire stake in the company in 2007, three years before the Russia deal and at least 18 months before Clinton became secretary of state. Of the remaining individuals connected with Uranium One who donated to the Clinton Foundation, only one was found to have contributed during the same time frame that the deal was taking place, according to The New York Times — Ian Telfer (also a Canadian), the company’s chairman: His donations through the Fernwood Foundation included $1 million reported in 2009, the year his company appealed to the American Embassy to help it keep its mines in Kazakhstan; $250,000 in 2010, the year the Russians sought majority control; as well as $600,000 in 2011 and $500,000 in 2012. Mr. Telfer said that his donations had nothing to do with his business dealings, and that he had never discussed Uranium One with Mr. or Mrs. Clinton. He said he had given the money because he wanted to support Mr. Giustra’s charitable endeavors with Mr. Clinton. “Frank and I have been friends and business partners for almost 20 years,” he said. In addition to the Clinton Foundation donations, the New York Times also cited a $500,000 speaking fee paid to former president Bill Clinton by a Russian investment bank in June 2010, before the Uranium One deal was approved: The $500,000 fee — among Mr. Clinton’s highest — was paid by Renaissance Capital, a Russian investment bank with ties to the Kremlin that has invited world leaders, including Tony Blair, the former British prime minister, to speak at its investor conferences. Renaissance Capital analysts talked up Uranium One’s stock, assigning it a “buy” rating and saying in a July 2010 research report that it was “the best play” in the uranium markets. The timing of Telfer’s Clinton Foundation donations and Bill Clinton’s Renaissance Capital speaking fee might be questionable if there was reason to believe that Hillary Clinton was instrumental in the approval of the deal with Russia, but all the evidence points to the contrary — that Clinton did not play a pivotal role, and, in fact, may not have played any role at all. Moreover, neither Clinton nor her department possessed sole power of approval over said transaction. Foundation Admits to Disclosure Mistakes One fault investigations into the Clinton Foundation’s practices did find was that not all of the donations were properly disclosed — specifically, those of Uranium One Chairman Ian Telfer between 2009 and 2012. The foundation admitted this shortcoming and pledged to correct it, but as the Guardian pointed out in its May 2015 discussion of Clinton Cash, the fact that it happened is reason enough to sound alarm bells: It is also true that large donations to the foundation from the chairman of Uranium One, Ian Telfer, at around the time of the Russian purchase of the company and while Hillary Clinton was secretary of state, were never disclosed to the public. The multimillion sums were channeled through a subsidiary of the Clinton Foundation, CGSCI, which did not reveal its individual donors. Such awkward collisions between Bill’s fundraising activities and Hillary’s public service have raised concerns not just among those who might be dismissed as part of a vast right-wing conspiracy. An enormous volume of interest and speculation surrounds the workings of the Clinton Foundation, which is to be expected. Given the enormous sums of money it controls and the fact that it is run by a former U.S. president who is married to a former U.S. secretary of state and presidential candidate, the foundation deserves all the scrutiny it gets, and more. At the same time, for the sake of accuracy it’s crucial to differentiate between partisan accusations and what we actually know about it — however little that may be. Update On 17 October 2017, The Hill reported obtaining evidence that Vadim Mikerin, a Russian official who oversaw the American operations of the Russian nuclear agency Rosatom, was being investigated for corruption by multiple U.S. agencies while the Uranium One deal was up for approval — information that apparently was not shared with U.S. officials involved in approving the transaction. The Hill also reported receiving documents and eyewitness testimony “indicating 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,” although no specifics about who those Russian nuclear officials were or how the money was allegedly routed to the Clinton Foundation were given. In any case, none of these revelations prove that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton participated in a quid pro quo agreement to accept payment for approval of the Uranium One deal. On 24 October 2017, the U.S. House intelligence and oversight committees announced the launch of a joint investigation into the circumstances surrounding the Russian purchase of Uranium One. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
homersapien 11,385 Posted July 23, 2018 Author Share Posted July 23, 2018 17 hours ago, AUFAN78 said: To accuse someone other than the left of whine is pure BS. It is disingenuous and pathetic. For nearly two years it's all the left have done. It has gotten old, tired and it is certainly unprecedented. That an election could cause this must anguish is laughable. I just wish the left would show some class and shut up with this nonsense. But hey, Maxine would be proud. Grab that rope. That's some vigorous - but pathetic - avoidance. Not a relevant word in the entire post. Classic case of focusing on the messenger instead of the message. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
homersapien 11,385 Posted July 23, 2018 Author Share Posted July 23, 2018 14 hours ago, Proud Tiger said: Are you sure he wasn't? lots of unproven speculation here. No indication the ambassador was in the private meeting so he is just doing talking points.....unless you know something the rest of us don't. I'm open to facts. I can almost guarantee you the meeting was taped by the Russians. Now Putin has even more on Trump. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
homersapien 11,385 Posted July 23, 2018 Author Share Posted July 23, 2018 On 7/23/2018 at 10:04 AM, aubiefifty said: lets try some real facts nola. what do ya say? you got your goobers gushing over your response except for one thing. it is a lie....... factcheck.org The Facts on Uranium One You lost him at "The Facts.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GiveEmElle 1,559 Posted July 24, 2018 Share Posted July 24, 2018 On 7/22/2018 at 8:36 PM, Proud Tiger said: Are you sure he wasn't? lots of unproven speculation here. No indication the ambassador was in the private meeting so he is just doing talking points.....unless you know something the rest of us don't. I'm open to facts. Facts Russia meddled in our election. Trump sided with Putin in Helsinki over his own IC. No other POTUS in history has ever sided with a foreign adversary over our own IC. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GiveEmElle 1,559 Posted July 24, 2018 Share Posted July 24, 2018 11 hours ago, homersapien said: I can almost guarantee you the meeting was taped by the Russians. Now Putin has even more on Trump. Urine a lot of trouble now Trump. -Putin probably Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Proud Tiger 4,261 Posted July 24, 2018 Share Posted July 24, 2018 12 minutes ago, GiveEmElle said: Facts Russia meddled in our election. ---we all know that. But it didn't affect he outcome. iIlegals voting probably had more affect. And the American people have spoken and Gallup poll shows the Russian mess is less than 1% of their concerns with immigration being far and away the most important. Trump sided with Putin in Helsinki over his own IC. ......No he specifically said he had confidence in the working level men and women. The top levels of intelligence deserve no respect. Clapper, Comey, Brennan, etc., have all lied under oath and committed perjury. No other POTUS in history has ever sided with a foreign adversary over our own IC.......guess America disagrees since Trumps approval rating went up slightly (1%) since the summit. Facts are often in the eye of the beholder and his/their emotions Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GiveEmElle 1,559 Posted July 24, 2018 Share Posted July 24, 2018 6 minutes ago, Proud Tiger said: Facts are often in the eye of the beholder and his/their emotions Illegals voting isn’t facts. Trump did side with Putin, that is fact no matter how you spin it. Trump’s approval rating doesn’t have anything to do with this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Proud Tiger 4,261 Posted July 24, 2018 Share Posted July 24, 2018 2 minutes ago, GiveEmElle said: Illegals voting isn’t facts....of course it is. Trump did side with Putin, that is fact no matter how you spin it........what did he side with him on that he hasn't later clarified? Trump’s approval rating doesn’t have anything to do with this.......it and the Gallup poll says indicates it has a lot to do with this. They are sick of it all and are more interested in immigration and the economy, which is doing great by the way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GiveEmElle 1,559 Posted July 24, 2018 Share Posted July 24, 2018 8 hours ago, Proud Tiger said: I have some magic beans I’ll sell you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
homersapien 11,385 Posted July 24, 2018 Author Share Posted July 24, 2018 5 hours ago, GiveEmElle said: I have some magic beans I’ll sell you. Have you started "The Republican Brain" yet? I'm a few chapters into my library copy but I already see I need to order a personal copy just for reference. We should start a discussion thread on it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GiveEmElle 1,559 Posted July 24, 2018 Share Posted July 24, 2018 1 hour ago, homersapien said: Have you started "The Republican Brain" yet? I'm a few chapters into my library copy but I already see I need to order a personal copy just for reference. We should start a discussion thread on it. I never got my copy so I’m thinking my order may not have gone through. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Proud Tiger 4,261 Posted July 25, 2018 Share Posted July 25, 2018 12 hours ago, GiveEmElle said: I have some magic beans I’ll sell you. I bet you already know what beans cause Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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