I reconvene our hearing. I gave my Opening Statement yesterday. I dont have anything to add to it but i got a few housekeeping things to take care of. Im disappointed that the twohour rule was invoked to shut down this hearing before we could hear from mr. Browders testimony. He traveled from overseas to be here to testify about the efforts to manipulate our government media. This is an important topic to discuss. If the other party is truly serious about getting to the bottom of the russian interference they should hear him out. Mr. Browder, i thank you very much for changing your travel plans to be here. I will introduce items into the record. The first is a letter by the Human Rights Foundation. He and others uncovered a corruption scheme and a Foreign Company laundering money through j. P. Morgan. He claims that the Foreign Company hired fusion gps planted slanderous news items and intimidated journalists who were going report on the corruption scheme. The second is by lee smith titled fusion gps of manufactured news for hire. The third is a New York Times article titled soviet vetterera. It describes the activities of a russian american lobbiest named in mr. Browders. So without objection those would be included in the record. I would like to introduce into the record senator crepel has a constituents who would like to submit written testimony about his experience with fusion gps. Without objection he may do so within one week from today. I also want to insert a letter from Airline Pilots association the letter alleges the association engaged the Political Activities on behalf of foreign state owned airlines in the middles. So without objection i will do that. Ill let the Ranking Member make any statement she has and i will introduce and swear or witness. Thanks very much. Yesterday we heard from government experts, representatives from the Justice Department and the fbi along with dojs inspector general. That confirmed there is a significant problem with under enforcement of the law. Individuals who lobby and engage in Political Activities on behalf of Foreign Government and interests in the United States do not register in a way that works with the Justice Department. Right now there are no real kons wenss for fail to go register. I think we should change that. As we also heard yesterday the Justice Department relies heavily on finding out about potential violations by monitoring other public information. At times the Department Also receives complaints alleging individuals or companies have failed to register their lobbying or other Political Activities on behalf of foreign interests. Today well hear from one such individual. I do not know mr. Browder. It is my understanding that in july 2016 he filed a complaint alleging that a number of individuals failed to register their russian backed lobbying efforts against the magnitski act. Among those named in mr. Browders campaign is the russian lawyer. As we all know she met with the Trump Campaign on june 9, 2016 with the understanding that she would offer incriminating information on hillary clinton, the campaigns opponent in the president s election. It is my understanding mr. Browder is very familiar with her and another person while he does not have firsthand knowledge of what happened on june 9 his experience with these specific individuals and his broader understanding of how the russian government operates may well advance the committees understanding of what motivated that meeting. With that i yield back glchlt thank you. Thank you. In 2007 russian government officials an members of organized crime engage until Corporate Identity theft, stole the Corporate Identity of three hermitage and obtained them fraudulently. It filed a criminal complaint with russian Law Enforcement. Mr. Browders lawyer was jailed and died under very suspicious circumstances. Brow der worked to get them to authorize the president to sanction russian officials in this and other human rights abuses. Would you please stand, sir . Do you affirm that the testimony youre about the give before the committee will be the truth, whole truth, nothing but the truth so help you god . Thank you for your affirm malgs. I would like to have you take seven minutes, if you can, but we would like to save time for questions. Lets say seven or eight minutes and then well ask you questions. Thank you for giving me this opportunity to tell the story about the Russian Campaign. Im bill browder. Im founder and ceo of Hermitage Capital management. We discovered massive corruption in the companies we invested in. To fight that corruption we Start Today Research how they went about doeng the tale steals and share that had with international media. This naming and shaming campaign had some positive effect on the share price of the companies and it was also made russia a better place for some period of time but exposing billions of dollars upset the people who were benefitting. Those people had very close connections with if put putin regime. In november of 2005 i was expelled from the country. I was declared a threat to National Security. In june of 2007 my Moscow Office was raided by 25 officers from the moscow interior industry. 25 raided the office of firestone duncan. In those raids they sought to get the investments for our holding companies. I hired the smart erts man i knew to investigate who did what and how we could stop them. He went out, investigated and came back with an astounding conclusion. He came back with that the purpose was to try to steal our assets which they didnt succeed in doing. They did succeed in stealing 230 million this taxes that we paid to the russian government from the russian government. It wasnt of my money or firms money but of the rush than governments money, 230 million. It was the largest tax refund fraud in the history of russia. We thought that putin was a nationalist, that he wouldnt have allowed his own officials to steal from his own country. We figured if we brought it to the attention of the highest authorities then the good guys would get the buy bad guys. We wrote criminal complaints to every different branch. I went to the newspapers. It turned out in putins russia there are no good guys. About six weeks after he testified against a bunch of corruption officials they came and arrested him and put him in pretrial detention. They put him in cells with 14 inmates, 8 beds and lights on 24 hours a day. They put him in cells with no toilet, just a hole in the floor where the sewage would bubble up. They would move him from cell to to cell and get him to sign a false confession that he stole 230 million. Because he refused the pressure increased and in six months he developed terrible pounds in his stoma stomach. He was needed an operation which was scheduled for the 1st of august. A week before his they moved him to a maximum security prison considered to be one of the most awful prisons in russia and there were no medical facilities there. His health completely broke down. He went into constant ear piercing pain and they refused him medal treatment. They wrote 20 tircht desperate requests. All of them were ignored in some cases denied in writing. After a couple of months of this horrib horrible torture his body could not longer hold out. He went into critical condition. On that night the authorities didnt want to have responsibility for him. They put him in an ambulance, sent him to a different facility. When he arrived at the different prison instead of putting him in an emergency room he was chained to a bed and they beat him until he died. He was 37 years old. He left a wife and two children. I got news of his murder the morning of the 17th and i have made it my lifes work since then to get justice. Justice was impossible to get in russia. They exonerated everybody involved gave honors to those most implicit. I came here to washington. I told senator Benjamin John mccain the same story and they came up with the magnitski act to ban visas of those who commit other gross human rights abuses in russia. It passed 924 in the senate. And was signed into law on the 14th of december, 2012. President putin was infur rated by this. He then banned the adoption of russian orphans by american families. This reason why is because putin was one of the beneficiaries of one of the 230 million fraud. We traced it to a man who has been exposed as being one of his nominees. Putin was so infuriated at the act that he put magnitski on trial, the first ever history of a dead man and put him as his codefendant finding us both guilty. A number of people have been killed. Seven people have died either from murder or suspicious circumstances and a number of other attempted murders. For example one of our allies in fighting for justice and coming to congress here he was murdered in front of coming to these organizations to lobby for the magnitski act. His protege was poisoned within an inch of his life. He went into critical condition. He was in coma. He had multiple organ failures and barely survived. The family lawyer was thrown off of a fourth floor balcony. I have had numerous threats for my own life. Its not just death threats. Its not just violence but also what i call Political Violence. The Political Violence came in the form of a Massive Campaign that the Russian Campaign launched here in washington. She organize newsed a number of individuals to come to washington and lobby and basically tell a false story that magnitsky wasnt murdered she engaged a number of people and the purpose of engagement was to repeal magnitskys act. In addition to it being effectively a campaign ill be done in one second. In addition to it being a campaign to effectively cover up a murder can you just ask the year he came and did this is this. You can finish your statement but right now would you ask your question . Im sorry i have gone over. We are not going to stop you. When he came to this country what year was that . I believe it was 2014. Sorry, i have gone over. Im just about done. In addition to this being morally rep henceable none of these people registered as Foreign Agents under the foreign registration act. I put together a complaint to the department of justice where we listed out what they did rngs who did what and the fact that they werent registered with Foreign Agent registration act. It is something that needs to stop in the future. I think that the rules governing this thing should be strengthened. Thank you very much. Yesterday we announced we were going to have seven minute rounds of discussion. Each member will have seven minutes. Mr. Simpson told the media he only did some research as Litigation Support. Propaganda worked for foreign principal required registration as a Foreign Agent. Its important to understand whether mr. Simpson was pushing negative information about you in the media. I have several questions along this line. Could you explain how mr. Simpson manipulated to undermine the act and how do you know about that . So Glenn Simpson was calling a number of journalists pitching a story to the journalists as the mact the story was that e had not been murdered but he died of natural causes. He wasnt a wlis l blower that he was a criminal. The story i told was incorrect and therefore it should be repealed. That was the story he was pitching. I know he was pitching that story because a number of journalists came to me to ask me about it. He was unsuccessful for the most part in getting that story written. It doesnt take away from the fact he was trying to get that story published. That is not Litigation Support. It is impossible for me to see how it could be Litigation Support because had those stories been written and during the litigation that he was supposed to be supporting any juror who had read those stories would have been disqualified. It could only have been for the purpose of trying to change legislation here in washington. Your complaint and your testimony today have an effort by this group of unregistered Foreign Agents. Were they working together or were these separate isolated efforts and how do you know and then what basis do you have for believing that fusion gpss efforts were in the interest of the russian government rather than in the holdings . To answer your first question this entire effort was under the she was the one organizing it. It was a highly resourced operation. It was being paid for by her client, which was the family of russia. They were paying the bills. The patriarch is a senior russian government official. He was the region the size of france. He is currently the second most important state company and she a Senior Member of the put putin regime. In terms of could you repeat the second part of your question . What do you have in believing the efforts were in the interest of the russian government rather tan in the interest of holdings in. It was under investigation by the department of justy for specific Money Laundering statutes. Even if they had been successful in repealing the act which is one and a million shot even if they had been successful it wouldnt have had any bearing. Okay. There have been media reports alleging that some of the stolen money went to a Russian Investment Bank called Renaissance Capital. What can you tell us about that and what is Renaissance Capitals connection if any with the russian government . Renaissance capital is a Russian Investment Bank. It was headed by at the time of this crime by a man named steven jennings. They trumpeted the fact that they had a number of officers on their staff. I should point out theres no such thing as a former fsb officer. Its a lifetime commitment. Went in the united kingdom. I think you said this but let me make sure about Renaissance Capitals connection if any with the russian government. It is connected to the russian government through fsb employees who were at the senior level of Renaissance Capital. This issue is also important to the committee. The same russian bank, Renaissance Capital paid 500,000 for june 2010 speech in moscow. Or let you know whether they that had acted on your complaint. The other was an in person meeting here in washington to follow up on the complaint. It was initiated by my firm and other than providing information i have no knowledge of what happened afterwards. Okay. Senator. Okay. Indeed youre a very brave man. I respect that and i respect your loyalty to magnitski. Having said that, its hard for me to understand why the act still sticks in the krau of russia and what vet l they would have to do with that. So what is the feeling of that . It is a good yes. I believe there are two reasons why putin, why this is the single most important Foreign Policy. The first reason is we have evidence that putins nominee who say famous cellist received some of the proceeds of this crime. It is a cellist the crime being what they took from your office. The 230 million in taxes he paid. He received some of that 230 million. Puti putin i believed to be the richest man in the world. That is held all over the world in banks and all over. The purpose has been to commit terrible crimes medical record crimes to get that money. He is at risk of the magnitski act. It is the first reason why he is so upset. The second reason is in order to get that he has had to instruct a lot of people working for him to do terrible things to arrest, kidnap, torture, and kill to take Peoples Properties away. As a result the only way he could get people do such terrible things is to say there would be no consequence. You would enjoy impunity. He can no longer guarantee absolute impunity. All of a sudden we created consequences in the west. I would not underestimate. Not only does it freeze the asset that is are held in america but the moment you get onto the list you get put on the list which is a treasury sanctions list. No bank wants to be in violation and therefore any bank fechb it is in south korea or dubai will close their account that day and as a result you become a financi financial, so its a consequence. Where does it come into this . It is the family lawyer for the family. It is a putin regime family. They own a company identified as received some of the money from the 230 million fraud. They ended up having to defend themselves in new york and they came with her. She became the point person to fight the Money Laundering charges. I should point out in fighting Money Laundering charges they spent between 30 and 40 million to save 14 million that have been frozen by the department of justice. So the incentive goes well beyond their own personal interest. She was president at this meeting on june 9th. What interest do you believe she had and what goal did she want to achieve . It is absolutely clear the interest and the goal. The interest and the goal in that meeting was to repeal the magnitski act. It is one thing we should conclude abou