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Expert: Oligarchs Targeted In Part Because They Could Hide Putin鈥檚 Assets - YouTube
Channel: MSNBC
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tonight
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i say to the russian oligarchs and the
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corrupt leaders who built billions of
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dollars off this violent regime no more
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the united states
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department of justice is assembling a
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dedicated task force to go after the
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crimes of the russian oligarchs
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we're joining with european allies to
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find and seize their yachts their luxury
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apartments their private jets
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we're coming for you or ill-begotten
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gains and president biden is wasting no
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time making good on that promise nbc
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news has learned that the administration
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could announce expanded sanctions
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against vladimir putin's cronies as soon
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as tomorrow the intention here is that
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by squeezing putin's inner circle it
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could put pressure on the ex-kgb officer
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to stand down today the justice
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department announced the task force that
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biden alluded to
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we will leave no stone unturned in our
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efforts to investigate arrest and
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prosecute those whose criminal acts
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enable the russian government to
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continue this unjust war for decades
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these oligarchs have sheltered their
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extraordinary and in some cases stolen
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wealth outside of russia in secret
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accounts and by acquiring vast amounts
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of real estate and other assets like
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yachts and private jets as new york
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times columnist paul krugman describes
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it the sums involved are mind-boggling
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researchers estimate that in 2015 the
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hidden foreign wealth of rich russians
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amounted to around 85 percent of
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russia's gdp now to give you some
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perspective this is as if a u.s
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president's cronies had managed to hide
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20 trillion dollars
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in overseas accounts
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wow joining me now is hagar chimali a
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former spokesperson for the u.s mission
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to the united nations and the u.s
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treasury department and host of oh my
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world on youtube um thank you so much
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for being here um i i i i think we're
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stealing from ali belcher i saw you
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talking with ali and it was a brilliant
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conversation so i'm so glad that i can i
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can nick you from him because you were
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great and i guess my first question is
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this because um
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ambassador michael mcfaul earlier today
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it made a really solid point i think
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that there are two kinds of oligarchs
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right they're the kind of oligarchs who
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like are stunning in europe they're in
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london you know they they own lots of
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yachts and they're moving their yachts
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right now and running away and then
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they'll be the ones who own like the big
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oil conglomerates inside russia the gas
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prompt the people behind things like
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that so i wonder if these kinds of
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sanctions actually hit the ones who
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matter and the ones who need putin i'll
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just give you some examples cnbc's
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reporting oligarchs are moving their
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yachts the u.s is looking to hunt down
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and freeze their assets roman abramovich
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one of them is
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shopping this chelsea football club um
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to try to sell it is that are those even
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the oligarchs that count
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they all kind of count in different ways
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and i i mean i see why the ambassador is
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dividing them into two because he's
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talking about those that the former
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leader boris yeltsin had created and one
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of president putin's main arguments
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during campaigning against boris yeltsin
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was you know look at the corruption he
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created when he was hypocritical because
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then he went ahead and created his own
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oligarchs and corruption but at the end
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of the day all of the oligarchs support
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president putin and putin's regime and
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they all benefit equally from each other
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they each need the other side and so
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when you're targeting the oligarchs it's
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not just about the possibility that they
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might convince president to stop the
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aggression it's getting at the
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possibility that president putin might
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ask them to hide and evade his own
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assets
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it's getting at the way they prop up
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president putin himself personally the
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regime russia's economy obviously which
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you alluded to it's the idea of
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disrupting and dismantling all of the
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kremlin's networks financial networks
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and so the russian oligarch arm of that
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is a key aspect of it a bonus of it
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would be if they convince president
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putin to change his mind
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how do you find the money though because
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here's the thing is that you know what
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you know i'm a layperson about this but
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you know it seems that putin is good at
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hiding as well there are people who said
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he's a trillionaire but nobody can find
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it it's in all these llc's he finds all
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these creative accounting ways of hiding
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the money i'm sure these the people who
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the ones who count the gas problem guys
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whoever we want to get at are also
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hiding their money how do we find it
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sure well it's typical for these types
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of leaders and oligarchs to create these
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kind of very complicated ownership
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structures to hide their wealth just to
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to not show who controls a bank account
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or business or who's the beneficial
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owner and ultimately the government's
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treasury department in partnership with
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europeans and others
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hunt and find those assets so the
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treasury department in particular has
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its own intelligence shop in fact it's
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the only finance ministry in the world
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that has its own intelligence shop so
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it's all these intel analysts who
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collect who sorry they don't collect
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they receive information and analyze it
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with the only purpose of this mission to
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disrupt and dismantle these financial
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networks and so when any time the us
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treasury sanctions a target you can
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think of it as the center of an onion
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and once it's sanctioned they continue
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to hunt down and identify and expose
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that entire network because it's part of
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enforcing the sanction so the idea that
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like it's a name on a press release and
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that's it it just doesn't work like that
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it's it they map out the whole network
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and they work with the private sector to
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ensure that if there's a bank account or
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business that they're not aware
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is owned in fact by president putin or
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one of these oligarchs they will either
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publicly sanction that business or bank
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account or whatever later on or
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depending on what it is they may go to
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the financial institution directly and
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say hey you may not be aware but this is
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who actually owns this account what are
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the chances that some
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u.s players get uncovered when you start
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uncovering where people are hiding their
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money you know there have been lots of
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stories about straw donations that have
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gone into i don't know some republican
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coffers here and there some senators
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have been named um have you know
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maybe you know we don't know like
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if is there a possibility that this hunt
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turns up some americans who are maybe
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doing business do we want do we find out
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oh donald trump or somebody else is
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doing business with them and if that
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information comes up and it's americans
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or straw donors that are in the united
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states what happens to them
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it's always a possibility it's not
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something that treasury pursues usually
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when things like this have happened
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you've had for example leaks like the
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panama papers and those those documents
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ended up on they ended up unleashing and
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exposing all sorts of individuals who
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were involved in shady financial
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structures and transactions and so on so
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you may end up having something like
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that but if an american person is
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involved it's not usually the treasury
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department that handles it if if that's
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usually that falls then to law
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enforcement to the department of justice
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and the fbi and what they do that's more
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money laundering for example if they're
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involved in money laundering or
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corruption these are against u.s law
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yeah so it's a legal procedure that ends
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up taking place after that let me go
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right back to the doj that won't even
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like prosecute donald trump but then
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that's a whole nother conversation and
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then i guess the last question would be
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let's say that one of these oligarchs
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has you know lots of yachts or they've
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got some sort of property that gets
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seized in this process
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what does the treasury department do
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with it do they sell it does the money
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go to the you know into the american
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coffers like what happens to these these
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properties
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yes the seizure of any kind of criminal
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assets
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goes to a slush fund for future law
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enforcement activities so usually yes
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they'll they'll probably sell off the
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assets but any proceeds made from that
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or any cash and all of it goes into a
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slush fund for future law enforcement
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activity and uh what we're showing you
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there on the screen and we put it back
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up is
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six oligarchs oleg derapaska you've
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probably heard a lot on the rachel
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maddow show she's talked a lot about
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some of these guys linda blavatnik
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alexey
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kuzmachev eugene schmidler dimitri
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rybolav
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you might have heard as well
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total cost of the real estate they own
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just in this country in new york city
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alone 588 million dollars so we're
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talking big big money hey guys tamale
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don't make too many plans for the 7 p.m
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hour weekdays monday through friday
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you're great thank you so much we
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appreciate you being here tonight
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do
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[Music]
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you
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