It was Michael Avenatti the lawyer for Stormy Daniels who first revealed cohens ties to the Company Columbus nova, which is associated with a Russian Oligarch named viktor vekselberg. The u. S. Based company deposited 500,000 into a shell company, its run by vekselbergs cousin. Vekselberg is a close ally of putin. According to the New York Times, both cousins and trotter and vekselberg have been questioned by special Counsel Robert Mueller impa. Michael cohens lawyer wrote, this document is concerning for a number of reasons, including the number of blatantly incorrect statement its contains. Nbc news has reviewed financial documents that appear to support avenattis claims. Yesterday in a statement the company denied that vekselberg was involved with the payment and said the firm was wholly owned and controlled by u. S. Citizens. They added after the inauguration, the firm hired Michael Cohen as a Business Consultant regarding potential real estate issues and other ventures. Mother jones cite s. E. C. Filings, reporting that Columbus Nova had Close Association with vekselbergs Russian Company called the renova group. You can see that vekselbergs cousin in trotter described it as his affiliate. They were sanctioned but have not been accused of wrongdoing with the investigation into cohen. Its unclear where the 500,000 payment from the russian affiliated company went. But according to what avenatti says these documents show, its a small fraction of the 4 million that Michael Cohen received, which some companies seemingly paid for access to the Trump Administration. The Russian Investigation is now expanded into an equally troubling pay for play controversy tied to the Stormy Daniels affair. Im joined by Michael Avenatti. I want to paraphrase a line from casablanca, a great film. Of all the law firms in the United States, why did victktor vekselberg go into Michael Cohens . I think its pretty obvious. Because Michael Cohen was advertising that he could deliver access to the highest office in the land. I mean, thats the only explanation. Michael cohen is no learned hand. Hes no legal genius. He doesnt know anything about accounting or real estate or aerospace or all the litany of other excuses weve heard from these companies as to why they hired Michael Cohen. Lets call it like we see it. They hired him for access to the u. S. President , period. Were they paying him money for a service or were they paying him to help out trump pay offer his bills to Stormy Daniels . How did that money get funneled from the russians potentially . Its fungible, i know that, but how could money like that fall into the same account that paid Stormy Daniels off for the 130,000 . Its a good question. There were multiple payments from january 2017 until august of 2017, totaling approximately a half a Million Dollars into that same bank account that Michael Cohen had established and used to pay the 130,000 to my client back in late october. Were not aware of significant funds having been deposited into that account during the months of november and december. By the time the Russian Oligarch directed that first payment in january, we believe that those funds and funds thereafter went to replenish that account from which the 130,000 had been paid. What was your reaction when you realized your case, which involved all kinds of aspects of the law and hanky panky and certainly coverup, when you realized there was a russian piece to this . It was shock and bewilderment when we first realized that. You go into a case, you never know what youre going to get. Its like a box of chocolates. But little did we know we were going to get this box of chocolates. And that these two distinct matters were going to be crosspollinated. I think at this point theres no question theyre crosspollinated. You raised the issue relating to the inaccuracies or alleged inaccuracies that Michael Cohens counsel have raised. I find it rather ironic. Theyre talking about 25,000 worth of payments, or deposits and weve identified over 3 million worth of deposits, but they dont want to talk about the payments from the oligarch or nof artis or at t or any of that. They want to distract away from the facts because the facts are damn ugly. Is that what Michael Avenatti referred to when he said it was inaccurate . When someones 95 right or 99 right, they call it inaccurate. What do you make of that . Was avenatti talking about that difference of a couple Percentage Points rather than the heart of the thing which is russia money came into his bank account . Well, you mean Michael Cohen. Yeah. But i think thats exactly what he was referring to there. Theyre talking about how its got all these inaccuracies in it, and the best they can point to is 25 grand. They havent pointed to a single inaccuracy on the issue youve teed up tonight, which is the payments from the Russian Oligarch or the entity at his request. Why do you think mueller let the Southern District of new york handle this case rather than handle it as the special counsel, if it was russianrelated . Or he didnt know about it . Thats an interesting question. We dont know when the referral took place. He may not have known of the payments at the time he referred it. Let me tell you what i know about bob mueller you knew what he didnt know . Its all a question of timing. Bob mueller is an incredibly intelligent, aggressive by, one of the best in the business. And i think hell be very careful as it relates to overstepping whatever boundaries he has by way of his mandate and i think hes wise to do that. Would you tell a judge your source for this document, this information about the russians and his cousin and trotter and this guy . Will you turn that over to a judge on request . It would depend on the circumstances of the request and whether we could protect the source of our information under the Attorney Client privilege. Let me say this, we havent done anything wrong in this case. We welcome the investigation by the treasury department. Were confident were going to be cleared. The bottom line is, the American People deserve to have this information. The remaining Bank Documents should be turned over by Michael Cohen. If he doesnt have anything to hide, he ought to release the 14 or 15 months another of Bank Statements and lets be done with it. Theyre not going to do that, because weve only scratched the surface. This whole thing stinks. What did you make of the mother jones story . David corns operation, they dug in deep, they show a strong connection between these american cousins, and trader, with vekselberg. They have a lot of history in this. They did a piece not too long ago, looking into many of the same issues. I thought that piece was pretty solid, very well reported. I was impressed they were able to do it in such a short period of time. I read it and came away very impressed with its conclusions. Great to come on the show. Thank you. Thank you. For more, lets turn to kim waily, former assistant u. S. Attorney and ken dilanian for nbc news. Your thoughts about the relationship between the cousin over here in the United States who apparently theyre saying was making the 500,000 investment with Michael Cohens firm, saying hes unrelated to his cousin in russia who may have had a geopolitical interest in this whole thing, thats certainly larger than some cousin in the United States. What do you make of the claim of independence . Listen, i think it looks like people are making whatever kind of factual distinctions they can make and its grasping at straws at this point. Were beyond the point where anyone could legitimately say there was no collusion between the Trump Campaign and the russians. I mean, we have after the election, we have a Russian Oligarch funneling money to mr. Trumps personal lawyer and we dont know where that money went. I mean, this is well beyond atmospherics of kind of being specific and detail oriented on some of these facts. I mean, were all headspinning at this point. Because its so complicated. Its a hot mess. And im glad that Robert Mueller is going to sort it out for the American People. Because it looks Like Congress isnt going to do anything about it from a political standpoint. What do you make of this bag of tricks . This guy is the jack of all trades apparently, Michael Cohen. Hes an accountant, a consultant. He helps people with real estate. This money is pouring in and they write down what hes doing for them. And you wonder if theyre just buying influence and they have to put something on the paper, kim. I dont know what the russian wants, but he went around all the law firms in new york and found out which one was trumps, who was his fixer. Of all the law firms in new york, it comes down to, why did they walk into his . This guys no big lawyer. So its access to mr. Trump, which on the campaign trail of course he made a big deal out of, with respect to hillary clinton. And we also have to wonder, okay, the math isnt adding up. We know 130,000 went to Stormy Daniels, but there was a lot more money in that account. Did it go to pay people to influence the election, to hack some of the emails . Did it go in exchange for lifting or being easy on sanctions for mr. Cohen also worked on a potential proukrainian, prorussian deal. We dont know any of these things. But were so beyond the bigger question in my mind is, how big is the fraud on the American People . Are we going to actually clean house and start getting things in order . Because this is just getting very, very disturbing. Ken dilanian, your thoughts . Chris, what we obviously have here is a massive influence peddling scandal. Michael cohen is getting money from companies purely because of his access to donald trump. The question is, do we also have a russia connection . Do we have a collusion connection with this oligarch, vekselberg . And i find it incredible that Michael Cohen was willing to accept half a Million Dollars from a russianlinked entity when the russia scandal was breaking. He had been named in the dossier as having gone to a meeting in prague. He denies this. But essentially coordinating a coverup of connections between the Trump Campaign and russia. Hes clearly part of the russia investigation. This is a guy whose fatherinlaw is ukrainian, hes been doing business with the russians for years. He was involved with the trump tower moscow, with a russian guy whos been linked to the mob. So the idea that he would take money from vekselberg, and he also accepted money from at t and from a drug company. We can understand that, thats washington. Weve seen that movie before. But what did this russialinked firm want from the Trump Administration . Thats not obvious. Its not entirely clear. Did it want sanctions relief . Vekselberg has an interest in a major aluminum firm that is also owned by oleg deripaska, a man under sanctions, having to reli relinquish his stake in that company. Lot of fascinating questions here. Why is it that everybody working with trump and the campaign, the transition, and now it seems, have one relationship with trump and another one with russians . I go back to my old arguments. Ive never seen so many russian related figures in my history of covering politics. Theyre all russia related in some way. I agree with you, weve never seen anything like it. Now donald trump has a history of being in the real estate business in russia. The condos in florida are called little moscow. His son once said, a large percentage of our assets are coming from russians. We dont know the answer. Potentially Robert Mueller knows the answer, if hes got trumps tax returns and his business records. He knows to what extent trump has been in business with and in debt to russians. But the American Public elected donald trump without knowing the answer to that and i think it hangs over the trump presidency, chris. Thanks so much, kim and ken. Coming up, Vice President mike pence says its time to wrap up the Mueller Investigation. Really, mr. Vice president . Just as new avenues of possible collusion are starting to emerge. That sounds like Richard Nixon saying a year of watergate is enough. And john mccain says gina haspels refusal to denounce torture is disqualifying. Can mccain still have influence on a party thats drifted so far to the right . And can trump use his breakthrough on the International Stage to get a fresh face on his presidency . Size ph thats the question for the hardball roundtable tonight. And you wont like this one, this is hardball. You might learn from this one, however. Its where the action is. S moret than a good bedside manner. I dont know how to say this. Its ok doc. Give it to me straight. No you dont understand. I dont know how to say this. Im just a tv doctor. They also know you should get your annual checkup. It could save your life. And now you can page a tv doctor to set up a checkup reminder. Call 1833pagedoc. Cigna. Together, all the way. With expedia you could book a flight, hotel, car and activity all in one place. The New York Times is reporting that Homeland Security secretary Kirstjen Nielsen was close to resigning after being publicly scolded by President Trump. Officials tell the times that trump berated her on wednesday in front of the entire cabinet for what he said was her failure to adequately secure the nations borders. Two of those Officials Say that nielsen has drafted a resignation letter, but has yet to submit it. Trump has reportedly urged nielsen to be more aggressive in handling illegal immigration according to the times. Quote, one persistent has been mr. Trumps belief that miss nielsen and other officials in the department were resisting his direction that parents should be separated from their children when families cross illegally into the United States. A report adds one person close to miss nielsen said she is miserable in her job. In a statement late today, nielsen said she wont be leaving her post. Well be right back. 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The threat of a possible subpoena hanging over the president , we appear to be approaching a showdown between Robert Mueller and trumps legal team. The latest sign, Vice President mike pence today called for an end to the special counsels russia probe altogether. Heres what he said when Andrea Mitchell asked him about Robert Mueller. Do you think he can be trusted . Do you think hes a bad guy . You know, our administration has been fully cooperating with the special counsel. Do you think his investigation is a hoax . And will continue to. What i think is that its been about a year since this investigation began. Our administrations provided over a million documents. We fully cooperated in it. In the interest of the country, i think its time to wrap it up. And i would very respectfully encourage the special counsel and his team to bring their work to completion. Well, pences language which comes as we approach the oneyear anniversary of the mueller probe, is eerily similar to what he heard from former president Richard Nixon after a year of the watergat