To be clear on today's Trump admin sanctions on #Russia for #Skripal poisoning:
- They are mandated under the 1991 Chemical & Biological Weapons Control & Warfare Elimination Act for chemical weapons use.
- WH blew past the law's 60-day deadline by a month.
1/
2/The law mandates a second, more Draconian round of sanctions unless:
-Russia assures the US it is no longer using chemical or biological weapons
-Russia allows onsite inspectors to ensure the government is not using chem/bio weapons
3/ That second round could include:
- Ending flights to US by Russian national carrier Aeroflot
- Banning all/most Russian imports/exports with US
- cutting off diplomatic relations
4/Russia now has 90 days to comply.
**90 days from today is Election Day**
5/ Since virtually no one expects Russia to comply with the law's conditions, in 90 days, the Trump administration will face a very big test of its Russia policy.
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What’s behind Trump-Trudeau feud? Under WTO, Trump can only impose tariffs on Canada by declaring it, in effect, a national security threat. Trudeau called it “kind of insulting” for Canadians to be deemed a threat having fought “shoulder to shoulder” with US in so many wars. 1/
2/ This is apparently the comment that led Kudlow & others to claim Trudeau “stabbed Trump in the back”. What is required to invoke national security exception under WTO? First, “security interests relating to fissionable materials or the materials from which they are derived”
3/ Second, threats “relating to the traffic in arms, ammunition and implements of war and to such traffic in other goods and materials as is carried on directly or indirectly for the purpose of supplying”
Its release is buried (likely intentionally) on the weekend but the Democratic Memo has some significant new information.
Item 1- Memo says: “FBI’s concern about and knowledge of Page’s activities..long predate the FBI’s receipt of Steele’s information..Steele’s reporting did not reach the counterintelligence team at FBI until mid-Sep 2016, more than 7 weeks after the FBI opened its investigation”
Item 2- Dem memo states Steele’s role was properly disclosed in the Oct 2016 FISA application, incl his political motivations. Republican memo argued the FISA application failed to note that Hillary Clinton’s campaign and DNC were indirectly paying for Steele’s research
#FusionGPS Transcript contradicts GOP argument #SteeleDossier was a political document. First, Steele went to FBI himself concerned Trump being blackmailed, fearing “national security threat” said Simpson 1/
2/When Steele met with FBI in Sept 2016, @FBI told him they had similar intelligence from “an internal Trump campaign source”, that is a “whistle-blower” inside Trump organization.
3/ #FusionGPS’s Simpson told Senate Judiciary that Steele reached out to FBI on his own and he alone selected content of the dossier, not DNC or Fusion