Anyone else get the feeling there's more to the $400 million mentioned yesterday? Same number sent to Iran, no coincidences. Not sure how it all fits together yet. In the story it says the $1.7 billion in interest came from the Judgement Fund but doesn't say where the $400 million came from.

Trump’s false claim that Clinton ‘started the talks’ to give $400 million to Iran

By Glenn Kessler August 3, 2016

“Our incompetent secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, was the one who started talks to give 400 million dollars, in cash, to Iran. Scandal!”

— tweet by Donald Trump, Aug. 3

The GOP presidential nominee jumped on an interesting report in the Wall Street Journal that the Obama administration shipped $400 million in cash to Iran at about the same time that four Americans being held in Iran were released after negotiations.

Our incompetent Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, was the one who started talks to give 400 million dollars, in cash, to Iran. Scandal!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 3, 2016

We will leave it up to readers to decide whether the facts warrant calling this some sort of ransom payment. But Trump is completely off-base about Clinton’s involvement.

The Facts

Clinton stepped down as secretary of state in early 2013. The deal involving the American detainees — including The Washington Post’s Jason Rezaian — was announced in January this year, three years after the end of her tenure. Clinton did initiate negotiations with Iran over its nuclear program — though substantial talks with Iran did not take place until after she left.

But Clinton had nothing to do with talks on the detainees. Those occurred on a separate track, which U.S. officials said was necessary to not raise the price to reach an agreement on Iran’s nuclear ambitions.

The $400 million payment — part of an overall $1.7 billion settlement of claims — was also announced by the State Department on Jan. 17, the same day that President Obama announced the release of the detainees. (He also made reference to a settlement of claims without mentioning a dollar figure.)

More:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2016/08/03/trumps-false-claim-that-clinton-started-the-talks-to-give-400-million-to-iran/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.d63c345b9b45

>>2186700

Here's that number again

For Clintons, a Hedge Fund in the Family

Since marrying Chelsea Clinton five years ago, Marc Mezvinsky, a money manager, appears to have settled into his life as Bill and Hillary Clinton’s son-in-law. He has regularly appeared at charitable events, once introducing the former president at the Clinton Foundation’s celebrity poker tournament by dryly saying, “You may have heard of my father-in-law.” And at the recent N.B.A. All-Star Game, Mr. Mezvinsky took a seat next to Mr. Clinton and his partner in charitable endeavors, Dikembe Mutombo, the former basketball star.

Beyond the glamour, being part of the Clinton family has provided Mr. Mezvinsky with another perk: access to wealthy investors with ties to the Clintons.

When Mr. Mezvinsky and his partners began raising money in 2011 for a new hedge fund firm, Eaglevale Partners, a number of investors in the firm were longtime supporters of the Clintons, according to interviews and financial documents reviewed by The New York Times. Tens of millions of dollars raised by Eaglevale can be attributed to investors with some relationship or link to the Clintons.

The investors include hedge fund managers like Marc Lasry and James Leitner; an overseas money management firm connected to the Rothschild family; and people from Goldman Sachs, including the chief executive, Lloyd C. Blankfein. Some of the investors in Eaglevale have contributed campaign money to the former president and Mrs. Clinton, who is widely expected to run for president again in 2016. Some have also contributed to the family’s foundation.

Identifying who put money into Eaglevale, a roughly $400 million fund that has had underwhelming returns for much of its brief history, is difficult because hedge funds do not publicly disclose their investors. Still, the overlap between at least some of Eaglevale’s investors and backers of the Clintons illustrates how politics and finance can intersect and shows the fine line the Clinton family must navigate as their charitable and business endeavors come under scrutiny in an election cycle.

A person briefed on the matter and close to the firm said the amount of investor money recruited by Mr. Mezvinsky is not large, amounting to less than 10 percent of the firm’s total outside capital. Clinton supporters also say there are more direct ways to cultivate favor with the family, such as giving to the foundation, where Chelsea Clinton is vice chairwoman, than by investing with a hedge fund that her husband co-founded.

More:

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/23/business/dealbook/for-clintons-a-hedge-fund-in-the-family.html