President Donald Trump may have fired U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara earlier this month, but that doesn't mean he's done dealing with Bharara's former team — and its investigations of Trump's administration.
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, whose pursuit of the Trump University fraud case ultimately led to a $25 million settlement, has hired public-corruption prosecutor Howard Master to focus on cases related to the Trump administration, according to The Wall Street Journal. While working for Bharara, Master prosecuted New York Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver in a high-profile anti-corruption case. In 2015 Silver was convicted of extortion, honest-services fraud and money laundering.
Master also prosecuted a fraud and kickback conspiracy involving New York City's automated payroll system. His case against Valeant Pharmaceuticals International and Philidor Rx Services LLC, which involves allegations of fraud and kickbacks, is awaiting trial.
At the time he was fired, Bharara was investigating stock trades made by Tom Price, whom President Trump appointed as Secretary of Health and Human Services, according to ProPublica. Price was known to have traded shares of health-related stocks worth hundreds of thousands of dollars when he was a United States congressman shaping policies that could affect those companies. The investigation would have determined whether his actions violated the Stop Trading On Congressional Knowledge Act or STOCK Act, which prohibits members of Congress from profiting from nonpublic information and mandates that they must immediately publicize any trades they are involved with. Price has insisted that his trading was transparent and followed the law.
There is no proved connection between Bharara's dismissal and the Price investigation or any other Trump-related investigations in which Bharara may have been involved.
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