Trump Jr facing Russian ‘treason’ investigation
PRESIDENT Donald Trump’s eldest son was last night accused of “treason” after emails showed that he was willing to accept Russian state assistance to influence the outcome of the American election.
As Republicans sought to defend Donald Trump Jr, legal experts said he could have left himself open to criminal charges for conspiring to commit election fraud or soliciting information from a foreign adversary.
The emails were exchanged between Mr Trump Jr and Rob Goldstone, a British-born music publicist who set up a meeting with Kremlin-linked lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya in June last year, two weeks after Donald Trump Sr secured the Republican presidential nomination.
The New York Times was about to publish the emails when Mr Trump Jr released them yesterday.
The messages are the most significant evidence yet to emerge in the investigations into allegations of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian officials.
Mr Goldstone wrote that he could pass on “very high level and sensitive information” that was “part of Russia and its government’s support for Mr Trump”.
The information came through a Russian billionaire developer who worked with the Trumps on the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow and is close to Vladimir Putin, the Russian president.
Seventeen minutes later, Mr Trump Jr replied: “If it’s what you say, I love it especially later in the summer.”
He forwarded details of the exchange to Jared Kushner, Mr Trump’s son-inlaw and senior adviser, and Paul Manafort, then Mr Trump’s campaign manager, who both attended the meeting with Ms Veselnitskaya, who had flown in from Moscow, at Trump Tower on June 9 2016.
The email chain will become central to Congress and special counsel investigations into potential collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign.
It is probable that Mr Trump Jr, Mr Kushner and Mr Manafort will be required by Congress to reveal what was said at the meeting.
Lindsey Graham, a Republican senator, said: “I know Donald Trump Jr is new to politics, I know that Jared Kushner is new to politics, but this is going to require a lot of questions to be asked and answered.
“Any time you’re in a campaign and you get an offer from a foreign government to help your campaign, the answer is, ‘no’. So I don’t know what Mr Trump Jr’s version of the facts are. Definitely he has to testify.”
Tim Kaine, Hillary Clinton’s running mate in the election, said: “This is moving into perjury, false statements and even potentially treason.”
Other Democrats called it a “smoking gun” and demanded to know what President Trump himself knew. The meeting took place a floor below his office on a day when he was in Trump Tower. The White House has said he only found out about it a few days ago.
In a statement, Mr Trump said: “My son is a high-quality person and I applaud his transparency.”