Rep. Mike Conaway (R-TX), who is currently leading the House Intelligence Committee's investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, told CNN this week that he doesn't see any need for Congress to scrutinize loans given by Deutsche Bank to President Donald Trump on the grounds that it isn't a Russian bank.
"I don't see the link at this stage," Conaway said, referring to calls to examine whether the Deutsche Bank loans establish financial links between Trump and Russia. "Deutsche Bank is a German bank -- I don't see the nexus... I bet every big bank has a Russian customer somewhere."
Deutsche Bank last year agreed to pay out $630 million in penalties after getting busted for being involved in a $10 billion Russian money laundering scheme that involved its Moscow, New York and London branches.
Deutsche Bank was also the one major bank that was willing to lend Trump money in the late '90s, after a string of business failures made him toxic for all other Wall Street banks. In total, Trump has roughly $300 million in outstanding debts to Deutsche Bank.
Because of the banks key role in funding both Trump and Russian money laundering operations, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) has said that he believes potential links are very much worth examining.
"I think the allegations on money laundering are credible enough that we ought to, in the exercise of due diligence, see if this was one of the other vectors of the Russian active measures campaign," Schiff said earlier this month. "To me, that is far more potentially compromising than any salacious video would be."
