Tag: Wilbur Ross

Citizenship question drives uncertainty over 2020 census

The following article by Lydia Wheeler was posted on the Hill website February 6, 2018:

© Getty Images

Uncertainly is swirling over whether the Census Bureau will be able to get an accurate population count for the 2020 census, as the agency considers a Department of Justice (DOJ) request to add a controversial question about citizenship status to the census questionnaire.

The stakes are enormously high.

Census data is used to redraw House districts, and the number of House seats each state receives also plays a part in determining each state’s number of electoral votes. Continue reading “Citizenship question drives uncertainty over 2020 census”

Commerce Secretary’s Offshore Ties to Putin ‘Cronies’

The following article by Mike McIntire, Sasha Chavkin and Martha M. Hamilton was posted on the New York Times website November 5, 2017:

Wilbur Ross, the commerce secretary, retained investments in a shipping firm with business ties to Russian President Vladimir V. Putin’s inner circle.

A Navigator ship chartered to Sibur, a Russian energy company whose owners include President Vladimir V. Putin’s son-in-law. The United States commerce secretary, Wilbur L. Ross Jr., retained an investment in Navigator after taking office. Credit Ola Westerberg and Adam Ihse, TT News Agency

After becoming commerce secretary, Wilbur L. Ross Jr. retained investments in a shipping firm he once controlled that has significant business ties to a Russian oligarch subject to American sanctions and President Vladimir V. Putin’s son-in-law, according to newly disclosed documents.

The shipper, Navigator Holdings, earns millions of dollars a year transporting gas for one of its top clients, a giant Russian energy company called Sibur, whose owners include the oligarch and Mr. Putin’s family member. Despite selling off numerous other holdings to join the Trump administration and spearhead its “America first” trade policy, Mr. Ross kept an investment in Navigator, which increased its business dealings with Sibur even as the West sought to punish Russia’s energy sector over Mr. Putin’s incursions into Ukraine. Continue reading “Commerce Secretary’s Offshore Ties to Putin ‘Cronies’”

Wilbur Ross Comes to D.C. With an Unexamined History of Russian Connections

The following article by James S. Henry was posted on the DC Report website February 28, 2017:

Trump’s Choice for Commerce Secretary Holds a Top Post With a Mysterious, Russian-Controlled Cyprus Bank

INTRODUCTION

In the midst of the Trump Administration’s many other Russian entanglements,[1] it turns out that  Wilbur J. Ross, Jr., the billionaire American investor who is one of Donald Trump’s closest advisors on trade and economics, has direct financial ties to several leading oligarchs from Russia and the Former Soviet Union or FSU.

The U.S. Senate should thoroughly investigate these ties before it votes on Ross’ nomination to be Commerce Secretary when it returns from recess next week.

Central to this inquiry is the question of Ross’s  role as Vice Chair and a leading investor in the Bank of Cyprus, the largest bank in Cyprus, one of the key offshore havens for illicit Russian finance. Ross has been Vice Chairman of this bank and a  major investor in it since 2014. His fellow bank co-chair evidently was appointed by none other than Vladimir Putin.

The Bank of Cyprus is just one of more than 100 direct and indirect investments that Ross listed on his U.S. Office of Government Ethics financial disclosure form last month. [2] He recently promised to resign as Vice Chairman of the Bank and disinvest from it within the next 90 days if his nomination is approved.[3] Continue reading “Wilbur Ross Comes to D.C. With an Unexamined History of Russian Connections”