Trump’s Russia ties go way back
Probe says Kremlin aimed early on to influence campaign
WASHINGTON — U.S. President Donald Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, was in touch as far back as 2015 with a Russian who offered “political synergy” with the Trump election campaign and proposed a meeting between the candidate and Russian President Vladimir Putin, the federal special counsel said.
Court filings from prosecutors in New York and special counsel Robert Mueller’s office Friday laid out previously undisclosed contacts between Trump associates and Russian intermediaries and suggested the Kremlin aimed early on to influence Trump and his campaign by playing to both his political aspirations and his personal business interests.
The filings, in cases involving Cohen and former campaign chairman Paul Manafort, capped a dramatic week of revelations in Mueller’s probe into possible co-ordination between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin. They bring the legal peril from multiple investigations closer than ever to Trump, tying him to an illegal hush money payment scheme and contradicting his claims that he had nothing to do with Russia.
Trump was undeterred, tweeting early Saturday: “AFTER TWO YEARS AND MILLIONS OF PAGES OF DOCUMENTS (and a cost of over $30,000,000), NO COLLUSION!”
Just before leaving Washington on Saturday afternoon for the Army-Navy game in Philadelphia, Trump told reporters “we’re very happy with what we are reading because there was no collusion whatsoever. There never has been. The last thing I want is help from Russia on a campaign.”
Trump described the investigation as a “very one-sided situation, but I think it’s all turning around very nicely. As far as the reports that we see, according to everybody I’ve spoken to, I have not read it, there’s absolutely no collusion, which is very excellent.”
The court documents make clear how witnesses previously close to Trump have since provided damaging information about him in efforts to come clean to the government and in some cases get lighter prison sentences.