The FBI is examining why Russia transferred nearly $400,000 to its embassies 'to finance' the 'election campaign of 2016'

Reuters

Russian President Vladimir Putin smiles during a press conference.

• The FBI is reviewing a series of wire transfers totaling more than $380,000 sent by the Russian government to its embassies around the world with the memo: "to finance election campaign of 2016."
• It is unclear which "election campaign" the money was for - the US election was in full swing, but Russia's lower house of parliament was also set to hold an election on September 18.
• Still, the wire transfers could shed light on a key claim made in the dossier alleging ties between the Trump campaign and Russia.

The FBI is reviewing a series of wire transfers totaling more than $380,000 sent by the Russian government to its embassies around the world with the memo: "to finance election campaign of 2016," BuzzFeed reported on Tuesday.

It is unclear which "election campaign" the money was for - the US election was in full swing, but Russia's lower house of parliament was also set to hold an election on September 18. Expats cast their votes in embassies, and the funds were transferred from Russia's VTB bank to approximately 60 embassies worldwide, according to BuzzFeed, between August 3 and September 20, 2016.

VTB, which is majority-owned by the Kremlin and was sanctioned by the US in 2014, transferred $30,000 to the Citibank account of Russia's DC embassy on August 3, prompting the bank to examine VTB's other transactions over the same period.

Citibank would then have been required to inform the Treasury's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN, if it noticed any suspicious activity.

The Senate Intelligence Committee, which has reportedly been made aware of the wire transfers, asked the Treasury for its FinCEN records back in April, the Wall Street Journal reported at the time. It received over 2,000 documents from the financial crimes unit, which contains over 200 million Bank Secrecy Act records involving more than 80,000 financial institutions.

A dossier compiled by former British spy Christopher Steele alleging ties between President Donald Trump's campaign and Moscow claimed that Russian "diplomatic staff" paid "relevant assets...tens of thousands of dollars" to provide "a two-way flow of intelligence and other useful information."

"Source E claimed that Russian diplomatic staff in key cities such as New York, Washington DC and Miami were using the emigre 'pension' distribution system as cover," the dossier reads. "The operation therefore depended on key people in the US Russian emigre community for its success."

The congressional intelligence committees have been examining the dossier's claims as part of their probes into potential collusion between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin during the election.

Special counsel Robert Mueller, who recently indicted Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort and his business partner Rick Gates, is leading a parallel investigation into Russia's election interference. Mueller began hiring lawyers in June with extensive experience in dealing with fraud, racketeering, and other financial crimes.

A meeting in December between Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner and Sergey Gorkov, the CEO of sanctioned Russian bank Vnesheconombank, is reportedly being scrutinized by Mueller's team as part of its investigation.