If you know Bill Browder's story already, you surely won’t mind hearing it again. It’s extraordinary. If you haven’t heard it before, get ready.
Bill Browder very well may be Vladimir Putin’s public enemy No. 1. Why? Remember that “Hillary dirt” Russia meeting that Don Jr., Jared Kushner, and Paul Manafort had with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya in June 2016 – the one the White House said was about Russian adoptions?
As you’ll hear, “Russian adoptions” is code for the Magnitsky Act – legislation passed in 2012 that now blocks more than 40 Russian government officials and businesspeople from entering the U.S., froze their U.S. bank assets and banned them from accessing U.S. banking systems. Bill Browder is the force behind the Magnitsky Act.
Everything about Browder’s story is made for a movie – His upbringing, professional career, and especially his life since an early-morning November 2009 phone call informed him that his lawyer, Sergei Magnitzky had been beaten to death by guards on a Russian prison floor.
And as we know from the recent UK poisoning of that Russian ex-spy and his daughter – as well as various journalist killings – sitting in Putin’s crosshairs is, to put it mildly, an uncomfortable place. Just this week – after our conversation occurred, so we didn’t discuss it – Browder was briefly arrested in Spain on a Russian arrest warrant. Turned out the warrant had expired, and Browder was released. But the threat is always there.
John Sides, political scientist and author of "The Gamble"
Stuart Stevens, chief strategist for Mitt Romney's 2012 presidential campaign
Doris Kearns Goodwin, author of "The Bully Pulpit"
Mark Halperin, co-author of "Double Down" and "Game Change"
Larry Sabato, University of Virginia's Center for Politics
Joe Scarborough, host of "Morning Joe" and author of "The Right Path"
Michael Beschloss on presidential second terms
Michael Beschloss, presidential historian
Jeff Greenfield on "If Kennedy Lived"
Jeff Greenfield, political analyst and historian
Gov. Howard Dean, Former DNC Chairman and Founder of Democracy for America
Ezra Klein, Washington Post Wonk Blog
Norm Ornstein, American Enterprise Institute
Rick Klein, Political Director of ABC News
Charlie Cook of the Cook Political Report
Stu Rothenberg of the Rothenberg Political Report
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