Report: FBI investigating if Russian banker illegally funneled money to NRA

The NRA logo.
(Image credit: Dominick Reuter/AFP/Getty Images)

FBI counterintelligence investigators are looking into whether Alexander Torshin, the deputy governor of Russia's central bank, illegally funneled funds to the National Rifle Association in order to help candidate Donald Trump win the election, two people familiar with the matter told McClatchy.

Torshin is close to Russian President Vladimir Putin and also a lifetime member of the NRA, and during the organization's 2016 gala in Kentucky, he met with Donald Trump Jr. Spanish authorities believe Torshin helped mobsters launder money through Spanish properties and banks, Bloomberg News reported in 2016, and had he not been tipped off by a Russian prosecutor, he would have been arrested while in Spain for a friend's birthday party.

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Catherine Garcia, The Week US

Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.