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Cpac conferences, national prayer breakfasts, nra meetings, conventions. she met with nra leaders when they went to moscow and hosted them. and it struck a lot of people as odd. what is this woman doing here? she was extremely flirtatious. she tried to maintain contact with a lot of influential republican lobbyists, activists. she had this very close relationship with this guy, paul erickson, conservative activist in south dakota. but what really got my attention was the alexander torshin connection. alexander torshin, who you mentioned, was a deputy governor of the russian central bank. he wa...

A year ago the current leader, doug, was predicted an alliance between trump and putin. that as a russian prayer breakfast. >> not only, julia was butina at two prayer breakfasts, she was trying to set up a back channel to get putin invited. who ever thought a prayer breakfast could be a security risk. >> that's absolutely right. she's been accused of running an influence operation. i think what we've learn in indictments is how early she started in this influence campaign. we keep talking about her being here on a student visit a. she was here before on a visa, sometimes those visas are spons...

>> what tepeople don't understa about the breakfast, it's not a government event. it's run by a private organize called the fellowship and the family. it believes this this precise action. the long-time leader of the organization has called it quiet diplomacy, back channel, back door interactions between international leaders, that they use the prayer breakfast to bring them together. the current leader, doug, was predicted an alliance between trump and putin. he preaccident in questioned that as a russian prayer breakfast. >> not only, julia was butina at two prayer breakfasts, she was trying...

She even went to the inauguration. and then the american evangelical community, where she was hosting and attending prayer breakfasts in both moscow and the united states, with extremely high-ranking republicans. >> how is that explained? a woman who was once selling furniture in siberia makes her way to the nra, the national prayer breakfast and the inauguration? how does that even happen? >> well, it happens when a foreign power's hostile intelligence agency goes out and recruits a woman, trains her, makes her an agent of influence or actual trained intelligence officer, then injected her in...

>> martha: president obama wasn't imposing sanctions at that point, right? >> he had already imposed sanctions. trump saying if you elect me you wouldn't need the sanctions. >> martha: let's talk a little bit about the back channels she was trying to establish and whether or not from your reporting she was able to really get anywhere with that. part of the investigation is whether or not there was funneling of money. in my mind, she is sort of like the human expression of a bot or a tweet or all the other efforts that they made. she is a much more traditional expression of that. in fact, over ...