Trump’s inaugural committee receives subpoena

Federal prosecutors from the Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s Office have issued a subpoena on Donald Trump’s inaugural committee, which requests documents regarding its expenditures and donors during the President’s inauguration last January 2017.

“We have just received a subpoena for documents. While we are still reviewing the subpoena, it is our intention to cooperate with the inquiry,” said the committee’s spokesperson in a statement.

Prosecutors showed interest into the possibility that the $107 million dollars raised by the inaugural committee were misspent, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal last December as cited by Reuters.

Aside from that, investigations were geared toward whether the donors have donated for the sake of political power and influence in administration positions, or if there have been foreign donors in the mix. Foreign donations to inaugural funds are illegal, according to the law.

The subpoena document, as reviewed by CNN, said that investigators are looking into a myriad of potential crimes, such as “conspiracy against the US, false statements, mail fraud, wire fraud, money laundering, inaugural committee disclosure violations, and violations of laws prohibiting contributions by foreign nations and contributions in the name of another person.”

It also requires the committee to show documents relating to the benefits received by the donors, including but not limited to “tickets, photo opportunities, and/or small group receptions.”

The prosecutors of the Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s Office have declined to comment.

The subpoena does not mention the name Tom Barrack Jr., the head of the inaugural committee. Barrack is a real estate developer and one of Trump’s longtime friends. He declined to comment.

On the other hand, the only name mentioned in the subpoena is Imaad Zuberi and his firm Avenue Ventures LLC. The reasons why the subpoena seeks documents related to Zuberi are unclear. According to records, it has been shown the Avenue Ventures had donated $900,000 to the inaugural committee.

“Imaadd knows nothing about a subpoena, other than what is being written. It is well known that after supporting President Obama and later Hillary Clinton that Imaad gave generously and directly to the Trump inaugural committee, but many others gave substantially more. If, in fact, he is named in this subpoena, never mind somehow named alone, he is bewildered why,” Steve Rabinowitz, spokesperson for Zubari, said in an interview with ABC News.

Meanwhile, the White House has not yet issued a statement about the matter as of writing.