REVEALED: The FBI started looking into Trump's shady Russia-linked business deals as early as 2014

President Donald Trump has in the past complained that the only reason he's being investigated for his ties to Russia was because he won the 2016 presidential election -- but a new report reveals that the FBI was asked to investigate his Russia-linked deals before he ever announced his presidential run.

The Guardian has found that the government of Latvia, a former Soviet satellite state and current NATO ally, asked the FBI to help out with an investigation into a proposed Trump-branded hotel that was to be built in its capital city of Riga.

The deal was in the process of being worked out with Igor Krutoy, a wealthy ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin. However, Krutnoy and his associates quickly called off the deal after Latvian law enforcement officials started questioning them as part of what the Guardian describes as "a major criminal inquiry."

The FBI began looking into Trump's side of the deal in 2015, which means that investigators has been looking into his Russia-linked deals for longer than had been previously known.

In addition to being interested in developing properties, Krutoy is also a music composer who has written songs for Emin Agalarov, the Russian pop singer whose Kremlin-connected father helped set up the infamous Trump Tower meeting between Russian officials and Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner and then-campaign manager Paul Manafort in 2016.

Read the whole report at this link.