Trump dictated son's misleading statement on meeting with Russian lawyer
- by Kelli Lowe
- in Global Media
- — Aug 1, 2017
According to the Post, on July 8, "Trump personally dictated a statement in which Donald Trump Jr. said that he and the Russian lawyer had "primarily discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children" when they met in June 2016, according to multiple people with knowledge of the deliberations".
According to the Washington Post article, the president personally intervened in the original plan, which was to release a full and truthful account of the meeting between Trump Jr, Jared Kushner and then Trump campaign manager, Paul Manafort and be ahead of the story before things got too messy.
But a few days later news broke that Trump Jr. arranged the meeting, believing he would obtain harmful information about Democratic presidential candidate Hillary ClintonHillary Rodham ClintonTrump dictated statement for son on Russian Federation meeting: report Kate Hudson mocks Scaramucci: "How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days" Tennessee Republican won't seek reelection to House MORE.
"He refuses to sit still", the adviser said.
"One of the lawyers of the Trump, Jay Sekulow, has reacted to this article, considering that" in addition to being inconsequential, these assertions are inaccurate and not relevant".
With the Times seeking comment, members of Trump's team, including strategic communications director Hope Hicks and White House spokesman Josh Raffel, met with lawyers for Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, who also attended the now infamous meeting, anonymous White House advisers told the Post. "Now someone can claim he's the one who attempted to mislead".
Another adviser said that the president may be handling tasks should be outsourced to his staff.
"He did not think that it is risky on a legal level, he sees it as a political problem that it must solve itself", said the same source.
This is a verrrry high level leak, apparently involving people who were aboard Air Force One on the flight home from Germany last month and close enough to the president to know what he was doing hour by hour during the trip.
Prosecutors typically assume that any misleading statement is an effort to throw investigators off the track, Zeidenberg said. "They are still treating this like a family-run business and they have a PR problem".
Were any of them involved in this story? @Canada, you still up?
However, Trump overruled the aides and directed his team to craft a statement characterizing the June 2016 meeting as unimportant and claiming that the meeting was primarily focused on adoption, per the Post.
But shortly after that first report, it was shown the initial statement was misleading. "He was coming back from the G20, the statement that was released on Saturday was released by Donald Trump Jr., and I'm sure in consultation with his lawyers".
It's fine. Everything is fine.
