Trying to figure out how much money Vladimir Putin has and where he gets it from would be no small task, but two members of Congress have introduced a new bill aimed at exposing the Russian president's personal wealth.
The legislation, introduced Wednesday by Rep. Val Demings, D-Fla., and Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., is called the Vladimir Putin Transparency Act and would, in part, require the U.S. intelligence community to provide Congress detailed information on Putin's personal assets or assets believed to be under his control -- an enduring mystery to Russia observers and analysts.
The lawmakers, both of whom sit on the House intelligence committee, indicated that the bill was in response to what the U.S. intelligence community said was continuing attempts by Russia to undermine American democracy.
"The best way to assail the power of Putin and his enablers is to go after the illegal and secret financial streams that fund their operations," Demings said in a statement. "It's time to fight back and protect our democracy."
"Putin and his political allies seek to weaken democracies worldwide by consolidating their political control through unethical means," Stefanik said. "I am proud to cosponsor this bill which aims to identify Putin and his allies for who they are: nefarious political actors undermining democracies."
A Senate bill re-introduced earlier this month also includes a requirement for a report on Putin’s finances from the intelligence community.
Putin's lists his official net worth at just $300,000, a number that is laughably low.
On the high end, financier and vocal Putin critic Bill Browder calculated that Putin could be worth up to $200 billion, according to The Atlantic -- which would make him the richest man alive by tens of billions.
Another Putin critic and political analyst, Stanislav Belkovsky, reportedly put the figure at around $70 billion, according to The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, a nonprofit organization based in London.
A former U.S. Treasury official, who studied Russian illicit finance, told ABC News he was skeptical of any public calculations about Putin's wealth because Russia's financial system is notoriously opaque, and because Putin likely wouldn't hold many assets in his own name anyway.
"Let's say he has assets. He's going to have it held through a layer of very trusted people. His name's never going to be on it," the ex-official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said. "Even if that were happening, it would be challenging to penetrate [that scheme]."
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In spite of the technical challenges on reporting on the Russian president's finances, former State Department official Brett Bruen told ABC News that "putting Putin's pocketbook in the public view is a smart idea."
"We need to pull back the veil and expose how he makes money," Bruen said. "This is a critical part of understanding what and who motivates Russia's actions. It will also make clear to the Russian people the level of corruption that reigns while they increasingly suffer."
The Kremlin quickly dismissed news of the effort.
TASS:
"It can hardly be taken seriously. Most likely it’s just some more Russophobic fuss. We’ve long learned to take that with irony," [Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry] Peskov said
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He remarked that US legislators for some reason preferred to spend much time on Russian affairs, including those of the head of state and other senior officials.
"Either their own duties are too few, or this is the way they see their main job," Peskov said.
Kremlin blows off US Congressional crusade to ‘audit’ Putin’s finances as Russophobic fuss (TASS)