Donald Trump Jr 'potentially confessed a crime' in his statement on Russian lawyer meeting, says legal analyst
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Version 0 of 1. Donald Trump’s eldest son may have already confessed to a crime in his statements about a newly-revealed meeting with a Russian lawyer, according to a legal analyst and former Justice Department official. Donald Trump Jr has admitted he met last summer with a Russian-lawyer said to be close to the Kremlin, after being informed she had damaging information about Hillary Clinton. “After pleasantries were exchanged, the woman stated that she had information that individuals connected to Russia were funding the Democratic National Committee and supporting Ms Clinton,” he said. “Her statements were vague, ambiguous and made no sense. No details or supporting information was provided or even offered. It quickly became clear that she had no meaningful information.” Since Mr Trump Jr’s admission to the New York Times, there has been feverish discussion as to whether this was proof of collusion between the Trump campaign and Moscow, that the President’s opponents claim took place. On Monday morning, Mr Trump Jr, 39, who now heads the Trump Organisation with his brother, Eric, and oversees his fasther's business interests, dismissed the news of his meeting as a “big yawn”. “Obviously I’m the first person on a campaign to ever take a meeting to hear info about an opponent,” he said sarcastically, on Twitter. “…went nowhere but had to listen.” But at least one analyst has claimed that Mr Trump’s eldest son may have already admitted to committing a crime in his comments about the meeting with lawyer, Natalia Veselnitskaya. “I think the main thing is what Donald Trump Jr admitted to in his statement,” said Matthew Miller, a security and legal analyst for MSNBC and former spokesman for the Department of Justice. “It is a crime to solicit or accept anything of value from a foreign national in a campaign. Now, the thing of value has never come up in this context before because we’ve never had a campaign like this that potentially colluded with a foreign government,” he said on the network's Morning Joe show. “But in other contexts, in bribery cases and extortion cases, a thing of value doesn’t have to be money. It has to be something tangible, but not money. it could be potentially accepting information. He’s potentially confessing in his statement to committing a crime.” Mr Miller said he believed that special prosecutor Robert Mueller, who is currently heading a federal probe into possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia’s alleged effort to interfere with tithe 2016 election, would want to examine the statements made by Mr Trump Jr. “The only way to trust what any of these people say is to put them in the grand jury, put them under oath,” said Mr Miller. “If Donald Trump Jr has the kind of shifting statements to a grand jury as he did to the New York Times, he’ll go to jail for that.” The revelation came as Mr Trump returned to the US from the G20 meeting in Hamburg, where he met with Russian leader Vladimir Putin for more than two hours. The Trump administration said the President had pressed Mr Putin over its alleged interference in the election, and the Russian leader had denied it. On Saturday, Mr Putin claimed that Mr Trump accepted his answers. “He asked questions, I replied. It seemed to me that he was satisfied with the answers,” he said. He added: “I believe it would not be entirely appropriate on my part to disclose details of my discussion with Mr Trump. He asked, I answered him. He asked pointed questions, I answered them. It seemed to me that he was satisfied with those answers.” Mr Trump said on his meeting with Mr Putin: “Sanctions were not discussed at my meeting with President Putin. Nothing will be done until the Ukrainian & Syrian problems are solved.” |