Advisers’ Russian contacts mount up
WASHINGTON — The top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee says testimony from a former foreign policy adviser to President Donald Trump’s campaign gives new insight into Russian efforts to influence Trump’s operation.
In an interview Tuesday, California Rep. Adam Schiff said “more and more pictures of the puzzle” are coming together after testimony from Carter Page, the former foreign policy adviser, and a guilty plea from George Papadopoulos, another foreign policy adviser to Trump’s Republican campaign.
Page, an unpaid adviser who left the campaign before Trump was elected, acknowledged in closed-door testimony to Congress last week that he had contact with a high-level Russian official while in Russia last year, according to a transcript released Monday. He told the House intelligence panel that he “briefly said hello” to Russian Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich when he traveled to Russia for a speech.
Under repeated questions about the contact — which he had at times denied in the past — Page said he had spoken to Dvorkovich after his July 2016 speech at Moscow’s New Economic School.
Papadopoulos pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI about his Russian contacts as part of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference. Court documents unsealed last week reference a professor who told Papadopoulos in April 2016 that the Russians had “dirt” on Democrat Hillary Clinton in the form of emails.
“You have these two efforts in parallel going on with two of these advisers,” Schiff said. “You have them both reporting back to the campaign. ... I hardly think that these are coincidental.”
According to the transcript, Schiff produced a campaign email in which
Page had written to other Trump advisers that Dvorkovich had told him “in a private conversation” that he had expressed support for Trump and the desire to work together. Page responded that the conversation had been less than 10 seconds long.
Page has offered contradictory accounts about whom he met there — at one point telling the AP that he hadn’t met with Dvorkovich. But his testimony on Thursday was under oath.
Page told the panel he had informed some members of the Trump campaign about the trip, including then-Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions. He said he mentioned in passing to Sessions, who is now U.S. attorney general, that he was preparing to visit Russia and Sessions “had no reaction whatsoever.”
The testimony could raise more questions about the extent of Sessions’ knowledge about interactions between Trump campaign aides and Russians. Sessions recused himself from overseeing an investigation into the Trump campaign in March after acknowledging two previously undisclosed conversations with former Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the campaign. Since then, Sessions has downplayed his own knowledge about communications between campaign aides and Russian officials and intermediaries.
Page has insisted that the trip was personal and not campaign related.
However, the committee produced an email in which Page wrote to campaign officials and asked them to let him know “if you have any reservations or thoughts on how you’d prefer me to focus these remarks,” apparently referring to the speech he was giving in Moscow.
He also suggested that Trump take his place at the speech — a suggestion that appeared to go nowhere.
In a statement prepared for the committee, Page insisted he had no personal information that the Russian government or anyone affiliated with it played any role in the 2016 presidential campaign. He said he was not approached by anyone during the trip who led him to believe they were planning to interfere in the election.