Trump’s lawyer hits airwaves to defend prez, son
Says meeting was legal
President Trump’s attorney took to the networks yesterday to insist Donald Trump Jr. did not break the law by meeting with Russians, echoing a Harvard professor’s contention that no law prohibits a presidential campaign from colluding with foreign nationals to acquire dirt on an opponent.
The president’s attorney, Jay Sekulow, defended Trump and his son in a series of appearances on five television networks yesterday, maintaining the president was not aware of last year’s scrutinized meeting between his campaign team and a Russian lawyer and lobbyist.
“Donald Trump Jr., himself said things should’ve been done differently. Having said that, again, none of that is violation of the law. That’s more process,” Sekulow told ABC “This Week,” reiterating that the president would testify under oath in the special counsel probe of Russia/ Trump ties. “I keep going back to this fundamental issue. What is the legal statute that has been violated here, or alleged to be violated here? What would be, in other words, subject of that questioning under oath?”
Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard Law School professor and renowned civil libertarian, said Sekulow is pointing out what he said is the futility of a law enforcement approach to the Russia matter.
“It’s a foolish waste of time to think about these issues legally,” Dershowitz told the Herald. “Democrats should be making an effort to prevent the re-election of Trump. It’s the wrong mechanism, a special counsel looking into this issue, because they’re not going to find crimes.”
Dershowitz said, “You can search up and down through the statutes book, and you just won’t find anything that’s in any way relevant. The First Amendment allows a candidate to acquire dirt on a candidate, as long as he does it legally ... a candidate has a right to use material that may have been stolen, but that’s truthful, against the candidate. And so it’s not even a close question.”
The meeting included Trump Jr., Trump son-in-law and now close adviser Jared Kushner, then-campaign manager Paul Manafort and Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya and Russian-American lobbyist Rinat Akhmetshin.
U.S. Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said yesterday that he wants everyone who attended the meeting to appear before his committee, one of several in Congress investigating Russia’s interference in the 2016 election and potential coordination with the Trump campaign.
“I want to hear from everyone in that meeting and get their version of the story, as well as I think we may find out there may have been other meetings as well. We don’t know that yet,” Warner said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”