Patton: Trump Advisor's Meetings With Russians Are Being Investigated

The Russians have been making persistent efforts to influence our presidential election in favor of Donald Trump. Its hackers released emails from the Democratic National Committee which forced the resignation of DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz, and they invaded voter files in Illinois and Arizona. Instead of condemning the Russians, Donald Trump called upon them to obtain and release emails from Hillary Clinton's private email server.

Now, meetings between Carter Page, one of Trump's foreign policy advisors, and influential Russians are being investigated. Well-known investigative reporter Michael Isikoff broke this story. "U.S. intelligence officials are seeking to determine whether an American businessman identified by Donald Trump as one of his foreign policy advisors has opened up private communications with senior Russian officials - including talks about the possible lifting of economic sanctions if the Republican nominee becomes president, according to multiple sources who have been briefed on the issue." (Yahoo News!, 09/23/2016).

Trump listed Carter Page last March as one of his foreign policy advisors. Page runs a consulting firm, Global Energy Capital, that concentrates on oil and gas deals in Russia and other central Asian countries. At the time Trump was badly in need of foreign policy advice. "As the primaries unfolded, it became increasingly obvious that Trump would need all of the top-of-the-line help he could get when it came to foreign policy. In an interview with conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt, Trump confused the Kurds with the Iranian Al-Quds Force, couldn't tell the difference between Hezbollah and Hamas and couldn't recognize the name of the leader of ISIS." (Julia Ioffe, Politico Magazine, 09/23/2016).

"(Page's) views on Russia show similarities to Trump, who has praised Putin as a strong leader and said that he would consider lifting sanctions placed on Russia after the country took Crimea from its neighbor Ukraine. Page has been vocal about opposing the economic restrictions on doing business with certain entities in Russia such as Gazprom, the megalithic state-owned gas company where he has invested and lost money because of the sanctions. (Christopher Brennan, New York Daily News,09/23/2016).

"Page came to the attention of officials at the U.S. Embassy in Moscow several years ago when he showed up at the Russian capital during several business trips and made provocative public comments critical of U.S. policy and sympathetic to Putin. 'He was pretty much a brazen apologist for anything Moscow did,' said one U.S. official who served in Russia at the time.'" (Michael Isikoff, Yahoo News!, 09/23/2016).

In July, Page traveled to Moscow where he met with influential Russians. "One of the officials Page allegedly met with, Igor Diveykin, is 'believed by U.S. officials to have responsibility for intelligence collected by Russian agencies about the U.S. election.'" (Aaron Rupar, Think Progress, 09/23/2016).

"A source told Yahoo News that during the same Moscow trip, Page met with Igor Sechin, the head of state-owned oil company Rosneft who has been called the 'second most powerful man' in Russia behind the president. Sechin himself (w)as sanctioned by the U.S. in 2014, and the source said that the close Putin ally brought up lifting the restrictions during the meeting." (Christopher Brennan, New York Daily News, 09/23/2016).

If Trump were to release his income tax returns, an act which would reveal his business interests here and abroad, these suspicions concerning his buddy-buddy relationship with Putin and Russia would be clarified. Think about it. Perhaps, that is one of the leading reasons Trump refuses to release them.

Gary Patton is the author of two books, Selling Mt. Washington, a political satire, and Outtastatahs: Newcomers' Adventures in New Hampshire, a work of regional humor.