Trump Jr. Releases Statement on Meeting with Russian Lawyer to Get Damaging Info on Clinton

Donald Trump Jr. changes his tune just one day later.

Donald Trump Jjr. at White House Easter Egg Roll.
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Image via Getty/Leigh Vogel

Donald Trump Jjr. at White House Easter Egg Roll.

Donald Trump Jr., the eldest child of the President of the United States, is looking to clear the air after the New York Timesreported that he agreed to met with a Russian lawyer linked to the Kremlin in June after he was promised damaging information on Hillary Clinton. It is being reported that Trump's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner, also attended the meeting with attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya which took place at Trump Tower on June 9, two weeks after Trump secured the Republican nomination. 

Trump Jr. argues that their meeting centered around a possible connection between Clinton and certain individuals in Russia who were funding the Democratic National Committee. "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," Trump Jr. said in a statement. “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.”

However, when Veselnitskaya turned their meeting into a discussion about the adoption of Russian children and the Magnitsky Act, a law created in the United States which blacklists any Russians suspected of abusing human rights, Trump Jr. backed out. "It became clear to me that this was the true agenda all along and that the claims of potentially helpful information were a pretext for the meeting," he said.

The most striking part of his recent statement provided by Trump Jr. may be how much it differs from the statement he provided the previous day. 

 

This latest bit of news comes after President Trump met with Vladimir Putin for the first time at the G20 Summit in Germany. Trump confronted Putin about Russian intelligence hacking the U.S. election, which he denied. However, the two connected very quickly, and spoke about counter-terrorism, cyber-crime, election tampering, Syria, Ukraine, and more.

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