Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., hugs his wife Jane O’Meara Sanders, during the inaugural luncheon in honor of President Donald Trump at the Statuary Hall in the Capitol, Friday, Jan. 20, 2017, in Washington. (Photo: AP)
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and his wife, Jane Sanders have reported hired defense attorneys amid an FBI probe into potential bank fraud and influence-peddling. The investigation surrounds a $10 million loan the senator’s wife procured for Burlington College to purchase 33 acres of land while she was school president, as reported by Politico.
The hiring of the attorneys was confirmed to CBS News by Jeff Weaver, the campaign manager for Sanders in his bid to win the 2016 Democratic Party nomination. Sen. Sanders hired supporter Rich Cassidy to represent him, while Washington defense attorney Larry Robbins has been retained for his wife.
Mrs. Sanders purportedly distorted school donor levels in the loan application she filed to People’s United Bank. A complaint was filed to the U.S. attorney in Vermont by Brady Toensing in 2016. That same year the liberal arts college closed.
According to reports, Sen. Sanders’ office tried inappropriately to get the bank to approve the loan.
Mr. Toensing, who sent a “Request for an Investigation into Apparent Federal Bank Fraud,” led President Donald J. Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign in the state. However, the investigation started under the Obama Administration.
“I filed a request for an investigation in January 2016 and an investigation appears to have been started right away,” he said in an email. “It was started under President Obama, his Attorney General, and his U.S. Attorney, all of whom are Democrats.”
“My only hope is for a fair, impartial, and thorough investigation,” Mr. Toensing added.
Sen. Sanders previously called the allegations “nonsense,” but last month during an interview with Kyle Midura of Burlington TV station WCAX he was pressed and his response was noticeably different. He added that commenting on the matter would be “improper.”
“Well, as you know, it would be improp— this implication came from Donald Trump’s campaign manager in Vermont,” Sen. Sanders said. “ Let me leave it at that, because it would be improper at this point for me to say anything more.”
Midura followed up: “You’ve previously said it was nonsense.”
“Yes, it is nonsense,” he acknowledged. “But now that there is a process going on, which was initiated by Trump’s campaign manager, somebody who does this all of the time, has gone after a number of Democrats and progressives in this state. It would be improper at this point for me to add any more to that.”
