Vice President Mike Pence, right, swears in Jeff Sessions, left, as the next U.S. Attorney General under President Donald J. Trump, second from the right. (Photo: Courtesy of the White House)
President Donald J. Trump defended Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Thursday night amid calls for him to resign and frantic attacks by top Democrats in the House and Senate. Attorney General Sessions said during a press conference earlier Thursday evening that he will recuse himself from any existing or future probes related to any campaigns for president.
“Jeff Sessions is an honest man. He did not say anything wrong. He could have stated his response more accurately, but it was clearly not intentional,” President Trump said in a statement. “This whole narrative is a way of saving face for Democrats losing an election that everyone thought they were supposed to win. The Democrats are overplaying their hand. They lost the election, and now they have lost their grip on reality.”
The calls for resignation–including from House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.–come after a Washington Post reported Wednesday night claimed he had two previously undisclosed meetings with the Russian ambassador to the U.S. in 2016 after he started supporting then-Mr. Trump’s presidential bid. Democrats say he failed to disclose those contacts–one being a public party with many other people hosted by The Heritage Foundation, and the other in an official capacity as U.S. senator–during his confirmation hearing.
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A Department of Justice official confirmed Wednesday night that Mr. Sessions did have two contacts with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, but not in a campaign capacity. One with members of his staff on Sept. 8, which was listed on his public schedule, and another after giving a speech to the Heritage Foundation in July.
“Let me be clear: I never had meetings with Russian operatives or Russian intermediaries about the Trump campaign,” Attorney General Sessions told reporters. “And the idea that I was part of a continuing exchange of information during the campaign between Trump surrogates and intermediaries to the Russian government are false.”
AG Sessions further said that his answer to Sen. Al Franken, D-Minn., during his confirmation hearing for attorney general “was honest and correct as I understood it at the time.”
Sen. Franken had asked about CNN and Washington Post reports citing unnamed sources claiming top campaign officials had multiple contacts with Russian intel agents during the election, claims that are vehemently disputed by sources at the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The FBI has said publicly that no such connection has been made after thorough investigation.
“In the end, I have followed the right procedure, just as I promised the committee I would,” he said of the decision to recuse himself. “A proper decision, I believe, has been reached.”
A DOJ spokeswoman said in a statement Wednesday night that the meetings came as part of Sessions’ role at the time as a senator on the Armed Services Committee and that his answers during the confirmation process were not “misleading.”
“The real story is all of the illegal leaks of classified and other information. It is a total ‘witch hunt!,'” President Trump added.
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martykayzee / March 5, 2017
Every American with an IQ under 50 voted for this sociopathic carnival barker and we, the elite, are just beginning to enjoy it. It’s more fun than if Hillary had won.
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