Allies fear for Trump
THE White House has admitted Donald Trump helped draft a misleading statement about his son’s meeting with a Kremlin-connected lawyer — deepening the president’s entanglement in the saga over his team’s ties to Russia.
White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Mr Trump had “weighed in, offered suggestions, like any father would”.
His intervention, reported by the Washington Post, casts doubt on claims he knew noth- ing about a meeting in the 2016 campaign that is now central to a federal investigation.
Allies fear that such a level of involvement, if proven, could put the Republican billionaire jeopardy.
Politically, it will only intensify allegations the White House is trying to cover up connections with a foreign government accused of trying to tilt the November election.
“This was . . . unnecessary,” an adviser told the Post.
“Now someone can claim he’s the one who attempted to mislead. Somebody can argue the president is saying he doesn’t want you to say the whole truth.” leader in legal
Mr Trump’s lawyer Jay Sekulow dismissed the report as “misinformed”.
Emails show Mr Trump’s son Donald Jr, son-in-law Jared Kushner and then campaign manager Paul Manafort met Kremlin-connected officials in June 2016 in the hope of getting dirt on Democratic rival Hillary Clinton.
On the other side of the table were governmentconnected lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya, Russian real estate player Ike Kaveladze and Rinat Akhmetshin, who has denied long-standing allegations that he works for Russian intelligence.
A British middleman pitched the meeting as a chance for the campaign to obtain “high level and sensitive information” as “part of Russia and its government’s support” for the now president.
In a statement — allegedly dictated by Mr Trump — Donald Jr said the meeting “discussed a program about the adoption of Russian children”.