Trump’s attorney general in trouble over Russia links
Jeff Sessions ready to recuse himself from US probe into hacking
WASHINGTON: The Trump administration has been hit by a fresh storm over dealings with Moscow after attorney general Jeff Sessions was found to have not disclosed his contacts with the Russian ambassador to the US in the thick of the race for the White House in 2016 in which he was a top adviser to the Republican nominee, Donald Trump.
On Thursday, Sessions said he would recuse himself “whenever it’s appropriate” from Justice Department probes into alleged ties between Trump’s campaign and the Russian government.
Sessions met twice with Russia’s ambassador Sergey Kislyak last year, the White House confirmed, while he was serving as both a senator and a top foreign policy adviser to Trump’s campaign. The White House insisted he did nothing wrong.
“I have said whenever it’s appropriate, I will recuse myself. There’s no doubt about that,” Sessions told NBC News.
Sessions, then a Republican senator, met the envoy in his chamber in Capitol Hill in September during the peak of a controversy about Russian hacking of the computer network of the Democratic party, and once before on the sidelines of the Republican party convention in July. When asked, during the confirmation hearing as attorney general in January, what he would do if he found proof of contacts between Trump campaign officials and Russia, Sessions said, “I’m not aware of any of those activities. I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign and I did not have communications with the Russians.” To a specific question if he had had any contacts himself, he had said “No”.