Maria Butina's well-connected money contact highlights the breadth of her support network

Pisarsky seems to have connections to several people and entities of interest in the Russia investigation. For instance, he founded an award “described as a means of warming relations between Russia and the U.S.”

One award winner was Sergei Millian, an American citizen born in Belarus who founded the Russian-American Chamber of Commerce. 

Millian has claimed to work with the Trump Organization on behalf of its Russian clients, according to The Wall Street Journal. He told The Daily Beast that he didn’t personally represent Trump but rather just worked with him on certain projects. Millian also reportedly made statements that were relayed to the author of the controversial Steele dossier alleging ties between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin (Millian has denied being a source for the dossier). 

Pisarsky has also worked with Alfa Capital, a unit of Alfa Bank. Alfa Capital announced on Oct. 1, 2007, that Pisarsky was joining the company to work with its division providing asset management services to wealthy clients. 

“[I]n Russia, the number of successful wealthy people who are vitally interested in the comfortable and professional management of their savings is growing,” Pisarsky said at the time. 

Pisarsky’s firm also lists Alfa Bank itself as a client. One of the bank’s co-founders, billionaire German Khan, is the father-in-law of Alexander van der Zwaan, who spent several weeks in prison after pleading guilty to lying to special counsel Robert Mueller’s team about work his law firm did alongside Paul Manafort for the Ukrainian government.