At a time when Mr. Trump’s ties to Russia, and the people connected to him, are under heightened scrutiny — with investigations by American intelligence agencies, the F.B.I. and Congress — some of his associates remain willing and eager to wade into Russia-related efforts behind the scenes. Mr. Trump has confounded Democrats and Republicans alike with his repeated praise for the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin, and his desire to forge an American-Russian alliance. While there is nothing illegal about such unofficial efforts, a proposal that seems to tip toward Russian interests may set off alarms. Before Trump, I thought I'd only be reading this in a spy novel! But this blows away anything that I've ever read! OK first, Trump's attorney Mr. Cohen (with ties to Ukraine & Russia) and a Russian-American (Mr. Sater) and a Russian-Ukrainian (Artemenko) met in a New York private hotel conference room. The two Russians gave Trump's attorney a sealed letter outlining an agreement to hand over Crimea to Russia; to overthrow the Ukrainians' President and to have Russia pull out of Ukraine, but to "lease" the land back to Russian for 100 years! And for America to LIFT ALL SANCTIONS!! (Only in a spy novel! But it gets better!) Cohen first told The NYTimes that the sealed letter was placed on Flynn's' desk one week before Flynn was fired but after the White House could NOT find the document listed anywhere, Cohen later changed his story to another paper; The Washington Post saying that the meeting and the letter was true, but he never placed the letter on Flynn's' desk! OK, so where do we start? Why would Trump's personal private (non-government) attorney be involved in the first place? The attorney is one of several Trumps associates under scrutiny in an F.B.I. counterintelligence examination of links with Russia, according to law enforcement officials. The two others involved in the effort have somewhat questionable pasts as well: Mr. Sater, 50, a Russian-American, pleaded guilty to a role in a stock manipulation scheme decades ago that involved the Mafia. (He stabbed a man in the face with the shaft of a wine glass, total mobster!) and Mr. Artemenko spent two and a half years in jail in Kiev Mr. Sater, a longtime business associate of Mr. Trump’s with connections in Russia, was willing to help Mr. Artemenko’s proposal reach the White House, but Trump has sought to distance himself from Mr. Sater in recent years. If Mr. Sater “were sitting in the room right now,” Mr. Trump said in a 2013 deposition, “I really wouldn’t know what he looked like.” But Mr. Sater worked on real estate development deals with the Trump Organization on and off for at least a decade, even after his role in the stock manipulation scheme came to light. Mr. Sater, who was born in the Soviet Union and grew up in New York, served as an executive at a firm called Bayrock Group, two floors below the Trump Organization in Trump Tower, and was later a Senior Adviser to Mr. Trump! He said he had been working on a plan for a Trump Tower in Moscow with a Russian real estate developer as recently as the fall of 2015, one that he said had come to a halt because of Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign. Ukraine’s ambassador to the United States, Valeriy Chaly, expectantly was very angered upon hearing of this back room PRO Russia deal and said Mr. Artemenko “is not entitled to present any alternative "peace" plans on behalf of Ukraine to any foreign government, including the U.S. administration. It is a gross violation of the Constitution,” he stated in written answers to questions from The Times. “Such ideas can be pitched or pushed through only by those openly or covertly representing Russian interests.”