Around the time Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya met with US President Donald Trump’s oldest son last year, she was drawing attention from US government officials for her work with an investment firm attempting to weaken US sanctions on Russia. Officials tried to seize the attorney’s emails and at times denied her entry into the US, according to government and legal documents.
The scrutiny focused on Veselnitskaya’s ties to Prevezon Holdings Ltd and its owner, who is the son of a former Russian government official and a fierce advocate for rolling back some sanctions. Her work underscores the blurry intersection in Russia between business and government, which has deepened the questions about her and the June 2016 meeting with Donald Trump Jr and other Trump associates.
At the time of the meeting, Veselnitskaya was helping defend Prevezon against charges that the company laundered proceeds from a $230 million Russian tax fraud scheme. The discovery of the tax fraud scheme allegedly played a role in the 2009 death of Russian lawyer Sergei Magnitsky and prompted US lawmakers to enact a sanctions law in his name.
Veselnitskaya was also working with a group of lobbyists trying to weaken the Magnitsky Act, a $300,000 campaign partly financed by Denis Katsyv, Prevezon’s owner.
Trump Jr has said Veselnitskaya spent much of their meeting discussing the Magnitsky Act and one of its repercussions, Russia blocking US adoptions, despite the fact the sit-down was billed as an opportunity to discuss potentially incriminating information about Democrat Hillary Clinton. According to emails released by Trump Jr, he was told by an associate that the promised information was part of the Russian government’s efforts to help his father win the White House.
Veselnitskaya’s work history could become fodder for federal and congressional investigators probing whether the Trump campaign coordinated with Russia to meddle in the election. Veselnitskaya has denied having ties to the Kremlin, and Trump has denied any coordination with Moscow.
Rinat Ahkmetshin, a Russian-American lobbyist and former Soviet military official, described Veselnitskaya as a “very emotional person and a great patriot of Russia.” He said he saw no evidence of any direct ties between her and the Russian government.
“She’s a hard-working person, very loyal to her clients,” said Ahkmetshin, who confirmed on Friday that he, too, attended last year’s meeting at Trump Tower.
Akhmetshin said Veselnitskaya coordinated frequently with him and others last year in lobbying aimed at stripping Sergei Magnitsky’s name from the sanctions law. US proponents of the law said the lobbying campaign was also directed at weakening or defeating a proposed expansion of the original measure that authorised the president to sanction individuals, companies or governments complicit in human rights violations and corruption.
That bill passed in December and was signed by former president Barack Obama.
