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- President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign paid the law firm representing White House adviser Jared Kushner, a January 31 campaign finance disclosure form shows.
- The filings, first reported on by ABC News, reveal that the firm Winston & Strawn LLP received two payments in December of 2018 $55,330 and $42,574 each.
- The Trump campaign has covered the legal fees for multiple people connected to the campaign who were called to testify before congressional committees probing ties between the Trump campaign and Russia.
President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign used donations to pay the law firm representing Trump’s son-in-law and White House advisor Jared Kushner, a January 31 campaign finance disclosure form shows.
The filings, first reported on by ABC News, reveal that the firm Winston & Strawn LLP received two payments in December of 2018 $55,330 and $42,574 each.
Sources familiar with the matter told ABC that Abbe Lowell, an attorney at the firm who represents both Kushner and his wife Ivanka Trump, was the recipient of the payments.
Campaign finance regulations permit the use of campaign funds for legal services, so long as they are properly disclosed as campaign expenditures.
Kushner, a real estate developer and investor, was heavily involved in Trump’s 2016 campaign and officially joined the Trump administration as an advisor in 2017.
While the couple’s exact net worth is unknown, some sources have estimated Trump is worth around $300 million and Kushner as much as $800 million.
Read more: How Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner built their $1.1 billion fortune and how they spend it
ABC also reported that the Trump campaign covered the legal fees of people called to testify before Congressional committees investigating ties between the Trump campaign and Russia, including Kushner, Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr., and former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski.
Kushner testified before the House Intelligence Committee in December 2017 surrounding his conversations with Russian ambassador Sergei Kislyak, with whom he reportedly discussed an effort to create a secret communications back-channel between the Trump transition team and Russia in December of 2016.
Lowell also filed a motion attempting to take Kushner’s name off the list of defendants in a Democratic National Committee lawsuit accusing people associated with the Trump campaign of conspiring with Russia to tilt the race in favor of the Trump campaign.
As ABC noted, it is unknown whether the payments from the campaign helped cover the cost of Kushner’s defense in that particular suit. A judge has not yet ruled on Lowell’s motion.
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See Also:
- Prosecutors in Maryland have subpoenaed records from Trump’s DC businesses
- Trump said ‘you have to get rid of’ the Russia probe and parroted a Kremlin talking point in a wide-ranging interview
- ‘He’s doing the enemy’s job for them’: Current and former officials compare Trump to a toddler and say his attacks on the intel community create a goldmine for foreign governments
Source: Business Insider