President’s son met Russian lawyer a year ago
It is an early encounter involving Trump aides and a Russian during the campaign
The US President’s eldest son, Donald Trump jnr, acknowledged attending a June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower with a Russian lawyer tied to the Kremlin, one of the first confirmed encounters between his father’s inner circle and a Russian national during the presidential campaign.
In a statement, Trump jnr confirmed he had participated in a “short introductory meeting,” which, per his request, was also attended by Jared Kushner, the President’s son-in-law, and the chair of the Trump campaign, Paul Manafort.
“We primarily discussed a programme about the adoption of Russian children that was active and popular with American families years ago and was since ended by the Russian Government, but it was not a campaign issue at that time and there was no follow-up,” Trump jnr said. “I was asked to attend the meeting by an acquaintance, but was not told the name of the person I would be meeting with beforehand.” The meeting was reported yesterday by the New York Times.
Kushner’s lawyer said that the President’s son-in-law had disclosed the session previously on his security clearance forms. But the new public report adds to the roster of curious private meetings between President Donald Trump’s allies and Russians during and after the campaign.
The meeting with the Russian lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya, became public after President Trump met Russian President Vladimir Putin for the first time at the G20 summit in Germany. Trump questioned Putin about Russian meddling during the 2016 election; the Russian leader denied any such interference.
Veselnitskaya is well known to advocates of sanctions against Russia, particularly the Magnitsky Act, which prohibits US interaction with Russians alleged to have committed human rights violations. Congress’s passage of the law in 2012 angered Putin and led him to retaliate by halting American adoptions of Russian children.
Veselnitskaya told the New York Times that the participants in the meeting discussed the Magnitsky Act and the adoption issue. “Nothing at all was discussed about the presidential campaign,” she said. “I have never acted on behalf of the Russian Government and have never discussed any of these matters with any representative of the Russian Government.”
In Germany, Putin said that he thinks Trump agreed with his assurances that Moscow had not interfered in the 2016 presidential election, but suggested that reporters ask the US President what he thought.
The White House did not confirm or deny the suggestion that Trump had agreed with the Kremlin leader, who US intelligence agencies allege oversaw a hacking and disinformation effort. Putin said that Trump “asked many questions” about Russian interference during their closed-door talks. The Russian said he had repeated Moscow’s stance that “there were no grounds to believe that Russia interfered in the US electoral process”.
“It seemed to me that he took it into account, and agreed” Putin said, adding “you should ask him”.