They wanted to build the Las Vegas of the Baltics.
In 2010, a small group of businessmen including a wealthy Russian supporter of Vladimir Putin began working on plans to build a glitzy hotel and entertainment complex with Donald Trump in Riga, the capital of Latvia.
A senior Trump executive visited the city to scout for locations. Trump and his daughter Ivanka spent hours at Trump Tower with the Russian, Igor Krutoy, who also knows attendees of a fateful meeting at the same building during the 2016 U.S. election campaign.
Then the Latvian government’s anti-corruption bureau began asking questions.
The Guardian has learned that talks with Trump’s company were abandoned after Krutoy and another of the businessmen were questioned by Latvian authorities as part of a major criminal inquiry there — and that the FBI later looked into Trump’s interactions with them at Latvia’s request.
Continue reading: Exclusive: FBI looked into Trump plans to build hotel in Latvia with Putin supporter
The Secular Jurist 