Michael Flynn Fined $38,557 for Attending 2015 Gala With Putin: Report
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Michael Flynn Fined $38,557 for Attending 2015 Gala With Putin: Report.
Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, who served as President Donald Trump’s first national security advisor, has been fined by the US Army for attending a 2015 gala in Moscow to celebrate the 10th anniversary of Russian state news network Russia Today.
The Washington Post reported on Friday that the Army informed Flynn on May 2 that it is seeking to recoup $38,557.06 for his attendance at the gala, accounting for both financial payments and in-kind compensation.
The Army also determined that Flynn had violated the Emoluments Clause of the US Constitution, which forbids members of the military from accepting payments from foreign governments without prior authorization.
“When there is a finding that a military retiree has violated the Emoluments Clause, the United States Government may pursue a debt collection,” wrote Craig Schmauder, an Army lawyer, in a letter to Flynn.
In total, investigators determined that Flynn received nearly $450,000 in compensation from both Russian and Turkish interests in 2015, including for other work on behalf of Inovo BV, a corporation with ties to the Turkish government.
The Army will recover the nearly $40,000 sum from Flynn’s Army retirement account, according to documents viewed by the Post.
“A debt in favor of the government is created which is to be collected by withholding from retired pay,” wrote Sean O’Donnell, the acting inspector general at the Pentagon, in a January 2021 memo.
Flynn had previously discussed the fine in an interview on Real America’s Voice, a right-wing news outlet.
“They don’t like people like me, because they know that they do not want me coming back into government,” he said, casting the fine as the result of a partisan exercise. “So I’m not surprised at this. It’s just another dig, another means to to embarrass, another way that they just want me to shut up.”
“They’re just going to reach into my retirement and they’re going to take some money out,” he said. “But at the end of the day, this country means a heck of a lot more than … what they will do to me.”
Trump selected Flynn as his first national security advisor despite President Barack Obama urging him not to do so shortly after Trump won the presidency. Flynn was ousted less than a month into Trump’s presidency after he reportedly lied to Vice President Mike Pence and the FBI about his communications with Sergei Kislyak, then the Russian ambassador to the US.
It later came to light that Trump asked then-FBI director James Comey to drop its investigation into Flynn and his ties to Russia.
Most recently, Flynn made an appearance during the January 6 committee’s June public hearings, where committee members displayed a video of him struggling to answer whether he believed in the peaceful transition of power. He eventually opted to plead the Fifth Amendment.
Flynn advised Trump to declare martial law and seize voting machines as part of an effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election results.
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