Before she waded into the fuel trade, Ms. Butina had made a minor splash among American conservatives as an ebullient graduate student at American University with a knack for meeting influential Republicans. She snapped photos with Donald Trump Jr., befriended Grover Norquist, the anti-tax crusader, and accompanied J.D. Gordon, a Trump campaign aide, to see the band Styx. To support herself in the United States, she relied in part on a Rockefeller heir, George O’Neill Jr., who has used his wealth to advocate better relations with Russia.
Government officials have said the charges against Ms. Butina stemmed from a counterintelligence investigation predating the 2016 election. The investigation has in part focused on a Russian official, Aleksandr P. Torshin, who worked closely with Ms. Butina for years. Mr. Torshin, a politician close to Christian conservatives in Russia, has been attending N.R.A. conventions in the United States since 2011.
Ms. Butina worked as an unpaid assistant for Mr. Torshin in Russia. Through him, she met Mr. Erickson, who twice visited Moscow, and leading members of the N.R.A., including the Keenes.
In March 2017, emails show, the couple met a man in Virginia who said he was seeking five million barrels of jet fuel. He offered to pay a finder’s fee of $1 million if they connected him with a Russian refinery.
In a series of terse, businesslike emails, Ms. Keene enlisted Ms. Butina’s help. On April 15, 2017, she pressed the young Russian to secure a “soft corporate offer” from Gazprom for the fuel. “I will NOT reveal the source at this point,” Ms. Keene wrote.
Instead, Ms. Butina responded that she could cobble together needed fuel from a number of smaller refineries. She also pushed for a payment of $25,000 as a “good faith gesture” for potential suppliers.
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