This one takes a little explaining—but, if you work through it, it’s pretty ridiculous:
Bill Browder is a U.S.-born British citizen whose Moscow-based investment company was robbed of $230 million over a decade ago by well-connected Russians via a scheme that involved intimidation and tax fraud.
Sergei Magnitsky was a lawyer who worked for Browder and helped publicize the fraud/theft. He died in a Russian jail in 2008 under very suspicious circumstances.
The Magnitsky Act is a U.S. law passed in 2012 that sanctions Russian individuals believed to be involved in Magnitsky’s death and other human rights crimes. Browder is the most prominent public advocate of the law, which prohibits sanctioned individuals from using the U.S. banking system.
The government of Russia retaliated against the Magnitsky Act by forbidding U.S. parents from adopting Russian orphans. This adoption ban was the ostensible subject of the infamous July 2016 meeting between Donald Trump Jr., Paul Manafort, Jared Kushner, and several Russian and Russia-affiliated individuals who have been closely involved in the country’s efforts to smear Browder’s reputation and overturn the Magnitsky Act.
That brings us to last week, when Canada passed its own version of the Magnitsky Act. Russia, in an apparent act of retaliation, formally notified Interpol that Browder is wanted for Magnitsky’s murder—an accusation that seems ridiculous on its face and is indeed premised on what the New York Times describes as almost farcically suspect evidence. More concerningly, the U.S. has also apparently revoked Browder’s visa—a fact first reported by National Review and confirmed on Twitter by Browder himself:
The State Department doesn’t appear to have yet commented on the situation; I’ve put in a request for more information and will update this post when and if they respond. (Update, Oct. 24: Browder’s visa status has been returned to normal.)
