The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has been conducting a preliminary inquiry into Trump’s former Campaign Manager Paul Manafort’s foreign business connections, law enforcement and intelligence sources told NBC News yesterday.

NBC News reported in August that Manafort was a key player in multi-million-dollar business propositions with Russian and Ukrainian oligarchs, one of them a close Putin ally with alleged ties to organized crime, which Foreign Policy Experts said raised questions about the pro-Russian bent of the Trump candidacy.

Manafort was paid millions of dollars, $12.7 million in cash, according to The New York Times, representing a pro-Russian politician in the Ukraine.

Trump has taken a series of pro-Russian positions that experts from both parties say are far outside the mainstream, and inexplicable from a political viewpoint. He continues to cast doubt on Russian involvement in election hacking, for example, despite the intelligence community's public assessment.

"The relationships that Trump's advisors have had with pro-Russian forces are deeply disturbing," David Kramer, a former Senior State Department official in the George W. Bush administration and a former adviser to Marco Rubio's Presidential campaign, told NBC News in August. "Trump's attitude on Russia is not in line with most Republican foreign-policy thinking. Trump has staked out views that are really on the fringe."











NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote! Michael H. Drucker