In the emails, Mr. Sater predicted that a Trump Tower being planned for Moscow could be built with the help of the Russian government, and that the project would help Mr. Trump win the presidency. The pitch began in the latter half of 2015, when Mr. Trump was already running for president. American intelligence officials briefed Mr. Trump on the dossier in January, and it surfaced online soon afterward. As he pushed for the proposed Moscow project, Mr. Cohen sent an email to a spokesman for the Russian president, Vladimir V. Putin. But Mr. Cohen sent the message to a general email inbox, not directly to the spokesman, Dmitri S. Peskov.

Source: New York Times August 30, 2017 22:02 UTC