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Mr. Sessionss recusal was necessary, of course, because of his role as one of Mr. Trumps earliest and staunchest supporters, and his own undisclosed contacts with Russian officials facts that make it impossible for him to maintain the neutrality and independence essential to any credible inquiry. Mr. Trump, who appears to understand little and care even less about the importance of these limitations, thinks Mr. Sessionss job is to protect him by impeding those investigations. In other words, he expects the attorney general to obstruct justice on his behalf.

Mr. Trump is startlingly blunt about this, calling Mr. Sessionss recusal unfair to the president, as though he is owed a personal loyalty that supersedes the rule of law. The irony is that Mr. Sessions has been the most loyal of Mr. Trumps supporters, arguably more invested in implementing the Trump agenda than the president himself.

This page is no fan of Mr. Sessions, whose dark vision of America includes a hard-line stance on illegal immigration, a return to the war on drugs and other discredited tough-on-crime policies, and a government newly empowered to seize cash and other property from ordinary citizens without due process. But just as Mr. Sessions was right to recuse himself, he is right to stand his ground now, effectively daring Mr. Trump to fire him.

This demeaning cat-and-mouse game may be shocking to some of the presidents most blinkered advocates, but it only illustrates what any cleareyed observer has been able to see all along, which is that Mr. Trump cares more about protecting himself, his business and his family than anything else. To him, the rule of law, the principle on which America was built, is at best an abstraction. More often it is an obstacle to be evaded.

For that reason, Mr. Trump may in the end follow the advice of the conservative commentator Ann Coulter, who urged him to be a man and fire Mr. Sessions. Presumably that would be the first step toward getting rid of Robert Mueller, the special counsel overseeing the Russia investigation. Then Mr. Trump, and the rest of us, might at last learn whether his party will impose any limits on his desecration of the presidency.

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A version of this editorial appears in print on July 27, 2017, on Page A26 of the New York edition with the headline: Mr. Trumps Assault on Jeff Sessions.

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Donald Trump's Assault on Jeff Sessions - New York Times

Itll be at the heart of much-anticipated congressional testimony on Thursday.

Hannah Levintova and Dan FriedmanJul. 27, 2017 6:00 AM

Illustration by Mother Jones

All eyes on Capitol Hill on Thursday morning areon the testimony of Bill Browder, a longtime investor in Russia who spearheaded the passage of the Magnitsky Act, a 2012 law that has suddenly emerged at the center of the Trump-Russia scandal.According to Donald Trump Jr., Kremlin-linkedlawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya complained aboutthe law during their controversial June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower, to the apparent frustration of Trump Jr., who had been expecting a Russian emissary bearing incriminating information on Hillary Clinton. The law, sanctioning certain Russian officials, including members of Vladimir Putins inner circle, has been a major thorn in the side of the Kremlin, which has lobbied aggressively to repeal the measure. On Thursday, Browder, a hedge fund mogul who was banned from Russia in 2005, will speakataSenate Judiciary Committeehearing on enforcementof the Foreign Agents Registration Act, which requires people lobbying on behalf of foreign countries to disclose their activities. Browder will discuss how Veselnitskaya and several other political operatives lobbied to repeal the Magnitsky Act without registering as foreign agents, a possible violation of the law.Heres what you need to know about the Magnitsky Act.

Who is Magnitsky?

The law is named after Sergei Magnitsky, a Russian lawyer representing Browder who died in a Russian prison under suspicious circumstances after uncovering a massive Kremlin-linked tax fraud scheme. The 37-year-old Magnitsky was in prison awaiting trial for 11 months at the time of his death.

Whats the story behind his death?

In June 2007, Russian authorities raided the Moscow office of Hermitage Capital Management, a London-based hedge fund run by Browder that had many investments in Russian companies. The authorities claimed to be investigating unpaid taxes by the firm. At the time, Magnitsky was working for Moscow law firm Firestone Duncan, which counted Hermitage as a client. Browder asked Magnitsky to investigate the reasons for the raid.

That request led Magnitsky to uncover a massive, Kremlin-linked tax fraud scheme involving 23 companies and hundreds of millions of dollars.In short, corrupt law enforcement and tax officials used documents seized in the office raid to draw up fake charters transferring ownership of Hermitage companies to a known criminal. Unbeknownst to Browder or Hermitage, officials then filed three lawsuits againstthose fake companies for breaching contracts (which were themselves falsified). Judges in thethree suits awarded damages totaling exactly$230 million, meaning that Hermitages balance sheet no longer showed a profit. This meant the thieves could apply for a rebate on the taxes originally paid by Hermitage. The application for the $230 million refundthe largest in Russias historywas filed on Christmas Eve 2007 and approved the same day.

Browder and Magnitsky reported Magnitskys findings to Russian authorities, filing multiple criminal complaints. Magnitsky testified against the police officers who raided Hermitages offices. A couple of weeks later, he was arrested in Moscow, charged with tax evasion, and jailed. He was pressured to give evidence against Hermitage in exchange for his freedom. When he refused, he was kept in jailfor 11 months beforehis death.

A 2011 investigation found that Magnitsky was beaten by eight guards and then denied medical attention as an ambulance stood outside the prison for more than an hour. Charges against one of the prisons doctors were eventually dropped, while the head doctor was acquitted. In 2012 and 2013, Magnitsky was posthumously charged (for a second time) with and convicted of tax evasionthe first posthumous prosecution in Russias history.

After Magnitskys death, Browder became a vocal advocate against Russian corruption and traveled to Washington to tell Magnitskys story to Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Benjamin Cardin (D-Md.), who eventually introduced the Magnitsky Act.

What does the Magnitsky Act do?

The original law sanctioned 18 Russian officials and businessmen thought to be involved in Magnitskys death. In 2016, the law expanded sanctions to include 44 Russian citizens, many of whom are high-ranking government officials. The law was framed as an effort by the United States to call out human rights abuses by powerful Russians.

It is the sense of Congress that the United States should continue to strongly support, and provide assistance to, the efforts of the Russian people to establish a vibrant democratic political system that respects individual liberties and human rights, states the text of the law.

Whats the connection between the Magnitsky Act and Putin?

The original 18 people on the Magnitsky list were, for the most part, relatively minor players in the Magnitsky affair, though several top Interior Ministry officials who had led the Magnitsky investigation were included. But the list has been expanded in recent years to include top government officials and aides close to Putin. In January, the Treasury Department added former KGB agents Andrei Lugovoi and Dmitri Kovtun to the list. Both Kovtun and Lugovoi, a current member of Russian parliament, are suspected by British authorities in the 2006 poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko, a former Russian intelligenceagent turned Putin critic.A close Putin aide and one of Russias top federal security officials, Aleksandr Bastrykin, was also added to the list.

The tax fraud that Magnitsky uncovered has recentlybeen linked to top Russian officials, including Putin himself. The Panama Papers, the millions of leaked financial documents published last year that detailed the offshore banking operations of hundreds of politicians and businessmen across the globe,revealed thatsome of the money from the tax scam Magnitsky uncovered was linked to renowned Russia cellist Sergei Roldugin. Through Roldugin, that money is also possibly connected to Putin. The Panama Papers revealed that Roldugin,a close childhood friend of Putin, was part of an intricate network of Putin associates who moved$2 billionthrough offshore companies that all linked back to Bank Rossiya, a bank that is often dubbed Putins wallet in Russia because so many Putin allies are shareholders. The papers also revealed that Roldugin may be a conduit for Putin himself, helpinghide the presidents mysterious fortune.

Whats been the Kremlins response?

Two weeks after President Barack Obama signed the Magnitsky Act, Putin retaliated by blocking adoptions of Russian children by US citizens. Between 1999 and 2012, American parents hadadopted 46,113 Russian children, according to the State Department.

Since Putins move, many Russians advocating for repeal of the Magnitsky Act have described their goal as resolving the adoption impasse. Adoption has become a euphemism, a benign shorthand for attempts to convince the United States to repeal the Magnitsky Act.

Adoption is a code, Browder told Mother Jones recently.When Putin mentions adoptions, its basically a hostage situation, where Putin is a terrorist who has taken his own children hostage and wants to negotiate their release and try to free up a ban on him and his government.

In this context, Veselnitskaya, the Russian lawyer tied to Putin allies, brought up adoptions during a June 2016 meeting with Trump Jr., President Donald Trumps son-in-law Jared Kushner, and then-campaign chair Paul Manafort. Trump Jr. originally claimed the parties in the meeting mostly talked about adoptions, though he was forced later to admit he took the meeting hoping to receive damaging information on Clinton supplied by the Russian government.Veselnitskaya has denied that she was acting on behalf of the Russian government to collude with the Trump campaign, saying that she simply discussed the Magnitsky Act and adoption.

Putin himself seems to have used a similar rhetorical approach in a conversation with President Trump, not initially disclosed by the White House, at the G-20 Summit earlier this month. Trump described that meeting in aninterview with the New York Times. It was unclear from his description if he fully understood the tie between adoptions and sanctions.

It was very interesting, Trump said. We talked about adoption.

He added, I always found that interesting. Because, you know, he ended that years ago. And I actually talked about Russian adoption with him, which is interesting because it was a part of the conversation that Don [Jr.] had in that meeting.

What would repealing the Magnitsky Act really mean?

Repealing the Magnitsky Act appears to be a priority for Putin and his allies because it hinders the ability of the officials on the list, many of whom have become rich while working in government, from entering the United States or using its banking system. The reach of the law is even broader because many foreign banks will not do business with individuals barred from banking in the United States. Repeal of the act would free those officials, and others who may be added to the list, to travel and stash money outside Russia.

Matthew Rojansky, who studies Russia as director of the Kennan Institute at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, says the Kremlin views the law as an effort at regime change, due to Browders prominent role in advocating for it. Browder has said he is seeking Putins ouster.

But the law is a relatively small piece of a broad sanctions regime imposed on Russia by the United States and the European Union. The collective restrictions are widely credited, in combination with falling oil prices, with damaging Russias economy. The sanctions include asset freezes for specific Russian individuals and entities and restrictions on engaging in financial transactions with Russian firms in certain industries. They also include restrictions on US exports, services, and technology for specific Russian oil exploration and production projects and bans on US exports of certain military items to Russia. Russia wants all of the sanctions repealed.

Where does the Magnitsky Act stand now?

Behind lobbying by Browder and continued international concern about Putins human rights record, the reach of the act continues to expand. The last additions to the list of sanctioned individuals came in early January, and the Global Magnitsky Act, signed by Obama in 2016, targets any foreign citizen responsible for extrajudicial killings, torture, or other gross violations of internationally recognized human rights committed against individuals in any foreign country. Britain has a Magnitsky Act similar to the US law, and Canada is close to approving its own version of the law.

The scandal involving potential Trump campaign coordination with the Russian government during the 2016 campaign has left the Trump administration weakened and, it appears, unable to pursue Trumps goal of achieving a grand bargain with Russia that includes the repeal of sanctions. The House on Tuesday voted 419-3 to approve a bill blocking the White House from weakening sanctions on Russia without congressional approval. The Senate is expected to easily approve the measure, sending it to Trump, who has wavered on whether hell sign it. If he does not, legislators appear to have ample votes to override his veto.

The Kremlin also appears to have abandoned hope of quick repeal under Trump. Russia has very low expectations for relations with Washington now, says Rojanksy. The overwhelming focus is on Putins March 2018 reelection, for which the narrative of conflict with the USA and the West may actually help deliver more popular support.

Image credits:Background: iStockphoto/Getty; Veselnitskaya: Yury Martyanov/Kommersant Photo/AP; Kushner: Bill Clark/Congressional Quarterly/Newscom/ZUMA; Putin: Metzel Mikhail/TASS/ZUMA; Don Jr: Richard Drew/AP

Hannah Levintova is a reporter in Mother Jones' DC bureau. You can email her at hlevintova[at]motherjones[dot]com. For more of her stories, click here.

Mother Jones is a nonprofit, and stories like this are made possible by readers like you. Donate or subscribe to help fund independent journalism.

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Donald Trump Jr.'s Russia Meeting Was Allegedly About the Magnitsky Act. What the Hell Is the Magnitsky Act? - Mother Jones

President Donald Trump's surprise tweets this morning announcing a reversal in the policy allowing transgender people to serve openly in the military is one of his clearest policy moves relating to the LGBT community since taking office.

The move marks a shift in his public stance, after his not taking a hard line against transgender rights during the campaign.

The tweets indicate that the Trump administration is ready to ban transgender people from the military. The president's announcement comes after Defense Secretary James Mattis last month delayed the review of an Obama-era policy that allowed transgender people to join the military.

Trump never specifically talked about the policy during the campaign, instead tending to talk about LGBT rights in relation to news events that were playing out at the time.

He first spoke specifically about transgender rights when the controversial "bathroom bill" went into effect in North Carolina during the campaign.

Though not committing either way, Trump called it a "very strong" move to force people to use the sex indicated on their birth certificate to determine which bathroom they used, while noting that the state was "paying a big price" for implementing it.

Those comments came during an April 21, 2016, appearance on NBC's "Today," during which he also said Caitlyn Jenner could use any bathroom she wanted if she visited Trump Tower in New York.

Despite Trump's earlier comments, his administration rescinded a guidance issued to schools by the Obama administration to allow students to use bathrooms that match their gender identity rather than the sex indicated on their birth certificate.

The reversal was announced in a letter to schools from the Justice and Education departments on Feb. 22, 2017, saying the Obama-era directive led to confusion and lawsuits over enforcement.

In April the Department of Justice dropped a lawsuit filed against North Carolina by the Obama administration, saying the state's legislature had replaced the original law.

After 49 people were killed at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, on June 12, 2016, Trump said that it was an example of how his more targeted immigration policies against Muslims would help protect the LGBT community.

He mentioned how his policies would help the LGBT community, connecting their protections to the fight against ISIS and terrorism, arguing that he would be more forceful on the issue than his opponent Hillary Clinton.

"Thank you to the LGBT community! I will fight for you while Hillary brings in more people that will threaten your freedoms and beliefs," he wrote in a June 14, 2016, tweet.

He included a similar reference in his speech at the Republican National Convention when he accepted his party's nomination on July 21, 2016.

"Only weeks ago, in Orlando, Florida, 49 wonderful Americans were savagely murdered by an Islamic terrorist. This time the terrorist targeted our LGBT community. As your president, I will do everything in my power to protect our LGBT citizens from the violence and oppression of a hateful foreign ideology," Trump said.

In 2000, when Trump publicly toyed with and later dismissed the idea of a presidential run that year, he was interviewed by The Advocate, an LGBT magazine.

While he was not specifically asked about transgender Americans' serving in the military, he said he would be supportive of gay people serving in the military.

"If a gay person can be a doctor or a lawyer or a teacher or take another position of responsibility, why can't they serve this country in the military?" Trump said.

"'Don't ask, don't tell' has clearly failed. Gay people serve effectively in the military in a number of European countries. There is no reason why they can't serve in the United States," he added.

When it came to his administration, he said he would want "the best and the brightest."

"Sexual orientation would be meaningless. I'm looking for brains and experience. If the best person for the job happens to be gay, I would certainly appoint them," he said in the interview.

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Donald Trump's past statements about LGBT rights - ABC News

I still remember my surprise when Jeff Sessions strolled onto the stage at then-candidate Donald Trump's rally in Mobile, Alabama, in August 2016, donning a "Make America Great Again" hat. It was the first show of support Trump had from an elected official at that level.

At the time, I still believed Trump's candidacy was a joke. Sessions' decision to legitimize him would only make the senator look foolish. But Sessions saw something in Trump's appeal I missed: The lawyer and politician who built a career around disenfranchising the already disenfranchised knew that after eight years of a black president, white Americans were ready to elect one who appealed to their sense of entitled resentment.

He was right; I was wrong. And now he's attorney general of the United States.

Or at least he's attorney general as I write this. It's quite possible by the time you read this column, Sessions will no longer run the Justice Department fired or forced to resign by a president who has so far spent a week humiliating him.

Trump isn't being subtle about it. He hasn't hinted he'd rather see his AG bow out gracefully. He's called him "VERY weak" and "beleaguered." (There's something poetic about calling someone beleaguered when you're the one beleaguering him.)

When other high-profile Trump supporters like Chris Christie, Newt Gingrich and Rudy Giuliani were dumped by the roadside without administration jobs, Sessions ended up with one of the most powerful jobs in the nation and the opportunity to enact the regressive agenda targeting minorities he's always dreamed about. So why is Trump humiliating him now?

President Trump isn't happy about the various investigations ("witch hunt!") into his campaign's possible collusion with Russia and his own potential obstruction of justice, but it's Robert Mueller's independent investigation that angers and scares him the most. It's run out of the Department of Justice; Jeff Sessions runs the Department of Justice. Ergo, by Trump's thinking, Sessions should be able to shut it down. But Sessions' recusal from the Trump/Russia investigation made his firing Mueller impossible. And it's that recusal explicitly driving Trump's fury.

Trump sees the recusal as the ultimate act of disloyalty. Why should he have appointed an attorney general who wouldn't be able to protect him? Forget that Sessions only recused himself because of the heat he faced for lying under oath in his confirmation hearing about his own contacts with Russians. Forget that protecting the president is not the attorney general's job. What matters is if you work for Trump, you give him your loyalty. Take James Comey: He wouldn't give his, and he's out of a job.

Only it isn't loyalty Trump actually wants from the people around him. There's something noble in true loyalty standing by a person who deserves your support and returns it. But loyalty to Trump is never a two-way street. He doesn't return it or even reward it.

Trump doesn't want your loyalty. He wants your fealty.

There's a real difference. When you sign up to join Trump's circle in any capacity, you're signing away your dignity. Sessions is just the latest example. Sean Spicer stood at a podium and lied for six straight months on Trump's behalf. He was a successful and well-liked political operative. Now he's an unemployed national punchline. Trump wouldn't even let the poor bastard meet the pope, just to humiliate him.

That's how Trump treats people who serve him faithfully. No one is safe from the president's mercurial moods. He even threw a passive-aggressive "he's a high-quality person" at his own son. Was it any wonder Jeff Sessions would eventually meet an ugly end?

You can live up to the demands of loyalty by always doing what you think is best for a person. But you can never live up to the demands of fealty set by an egomaniac like Donald Trump. You'd have to be telepathic and clairvoyant, knowing both what Trump is thinking and what all his future moods will look like. You have to anticipate every obstacle, real or imagined. You have to do more than just lie for Trump. You have to honestly believe his distorted, constantly shifting vision of reality. That's an impossible standard to meet.

I have no sympathy for Jeff Sessions. He's a terrible attorney general because he's a terrible human being. Since taking office, he has encouraged police toincrease asset forfeitures, told federal prosecutors toput people in jail as long as possible, spoken to ananti-gay hate group, ended an effort toraise standards of forensic science, ramped up enforcementagainst undocumented immigrants, shut down reviews ofabuses by police departments, threatened to take DOJ grantsaway from sanctuary cities, went all Reefer Madness, stopped a DOJ fight against a Texas lawrolling back voting rights, and moved backward ontransgender rights.

Of course Sessions should be fired. Our nation's top law enforcement officer should be someone who fights to restore the rights and power of Americans who lack both. But at every opportunity, Sessions fights for the powerful and against the oppressed. He has no place in a department named Justice.

But somehow Trump has managed to find the one bad reason to fire Sessions. The only thing he's done right since becoming attorney general was recusing himself from the Russian investigation (and that was only half-right he should have resigned), and Trump is on the verge of sending him packing because that action was inconvenient to Donald Trump.

To anyone out there considering joining this administration: This is the fate that awaits you. You can do what Comey refused to do and pledge your undying loyalty to Trump. It won't be enough. You can do everything he asks you to do. It won't be enough. It will never be enough. Only one person on earth shows President Trump the fealty he demands, and he sees him every time he looks in the mirror.

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Donald Trump Doesn't Want Loyalty He Wants Fealty - RollingStone.com

He keeps telling us that hes president and were not. Does he know that hes president and shes not? Does he realize that most Americans can go a whole day, an entire week verily, a month! without picturing her at a rostrum, hearing the melody of her stump speech or repeating, Im with her?

At least they could if Trump would shut up about her. I understand that he misses her, but, sheesh, send some Godiva chocolates and move on.

Many political observers have been marveling at recent tweets of his that blasted Jeff Sessions, his attorney general, for not reinvestigating and potentially prosecuting Clinton for supposed crimes. He ripped into Sessions anew at a brief news conference on Tuesday afternoon.

But the other half of that equation is Clinton, and its just as remarkable that more than eight months after Election Day, Trump is still hauling his vanquished opponent out for public ridicule and marching her toward the stockade. Did Barack Obama do that with John McCain or George Bush with Al Gore or Bill Clinton with the previous George Bush? No, no and no.

Many political observers have noted Trumps hyperconsciousness of Barack Obama, who was also mentioned in those remarks to the boy scouts, which were so inappropriately political and self-centered that parents actually lodged complaints.

But Clinton is more precious to him. While he merely itches to erase Obama from the history books, hes desperate to keep her at the center of every page. Beneath all of his braggadocio about the genius of his campaign strategy and the potency of his connection to blue-collar Americans, he knows that he made it to the White House largely because many voters didnt want her there and he was Door No. 2.

So he reminds them of that. Over and over again.

It would be one thing if he had amassed a trove of accomplishments and watched his approval ratings climb. But the opposite is true, so he depends on a foil who flatters him, a fork in the road that he can portray as rockier and swampier. Thats Clintons role, and its more important than Jareds and Ivankas and the Moochs combined. They whisper sweet nothings. She saves him from damnation.

Dont look at his campaigns relationship with Russia. Look at hers with Ukraine! Dont focus on Don Jr.s incriminating emails. Focus on her missing ones! And while youre at it, tally up how many of her donors are on Robert Muellers staff and take fresh note of her big-dollar speeches. Seldom has a scapegoat grazed in such a profusion of pastures.

Hes more or less back to chanting lock her up, as if its early November all over again. He has frozen the calendar there so that he can perpetually savor the exhilaration of the campaign and permanently evade the drudgery of governing and the ignominy of his failure at it so far.

Nov. 8 is his Groundhog Day, on endless repeat, in a way that pleases and pacifies him. That movie has a co-star, Clinton. If he dwells in it, he dwells with her. He can no more retire her than Miss Havisham, in Great Expectations, could put away her wedding dress. Clinton brings Trump back to the moment before the rose lost its blush and the heartache set in.

During the second of their three debates, he was accused of shadowing her onstage, but that was nothing next to the way he pursues her now. His administration slips further into chaos; he diverts the discussion to her. Shes the answer to evolving scandals. Shes the antidote to a constipated agenda or so he wagers. What stature he has inadvertently given her. And what extraordinary staying power.

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Donald Trump's Dominatrix - New York Times