VIDEO: Donald Trump Jr. Insists There Was No Collusion With Russians In Trump Tower Meeting
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Prior to the 2016 presidential election, 17 intelligence agencies concluded that Russia was behind the email hacks that were designed to damage Hillary Clinton's campaign.
Current and past members of the Trump campaign and administration, including Paul Manafort, Michael Cohen, and Donald Trump Jr., are currently under investigation for possibly colluding with Russia's efforts to interfere with the election.
Trump's eldest son cast his meeting with a Russian lawyer last year as simply an opportunity to learn about Hillary Clinton's "fitness, character or b qualifications," insisting Thursday to Senate investigators behind closed doors that he did not collude with Russia to hurt her campaign against his father.
Trump Jr.'s description of the June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower in New York, delivered in a statement at the outset of a Senate panel's staff interview, provided his most detailed account yet of an encounter that has drawn close scrutiny from Congress and investigative special counsel Robert Mueller.
He tried to dismiss concerns about a comment he made in emails leading up to the meeting that has attracted controversy. He said he was just being polite and "colloquial" when he emailed "I love it" to Rob Goldstone, the publicist who was setting up the meeting with a Russian who was said to have election-season dirt on Clinton.
Trump Jr. said it was "simply a colloquial way of saying that I appreciated Rob's gesture." Thursday's interview at the Capitol was the first known instance of Trump Jr. giving his version of the meeting in a setting that could expose him to legal jeopardy. It's a crime to lie to Congress.
Trump Jr. spoke to the committee for about five hours, leaving at midafternoon out of view of reporters. In a statement released afterward, he appeared to suggest he would not testify publicly before the committee, saying he trusted that "this interview fully satisfied" the panel's inquiry.
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