Dmytro Firtash, the Ukrainian oil oligarch and international fugitive with ties to Donald Trump, has hired the new crisis management firm started by Lanny Davis, perhaps Washington's leading crisis manager and a former aide to President Bill Clinton.
According to a disclosure form, Davis and his new firm Davis Goldberg Galper will provide Firtash with "legal representation in ongoing matters," to potentially include "correcting the record in the media and elsewhere in the face of distortions and inaccuracies and advising on such media strategies for such purposes." Firtash hired Davis and his previous firm to perform similar tasks in 2014.
Firtash is a former business partner to Trump's former campaign manager Paul Manafort. In 2008, Firtash planned to invest $100 million to help Manafort redevelop a New York hotel, though the deal did not go through. The ties to the controversial Ukrainian billionaire have not stopped Manafort from recently returning to Trump as an adviser.
Firtash is wanted for corruption in the U.S. Last week, Spain requested his extradition from Austria, where he's lived since Ukraine's 2014 revolution, for alleged money laundering. The country dismissed a similar request by the U.S. last year.
The oil tycool is paying law firm Davis Goldberg Galper an estimated $80,000 per month until mid-January, with the option to renew the contract then.
