President Donald Trump's intentionally misleading an initial statement he reportedly dictated for his son, Donald Jr., regarding his meeting with a Russian lawyer during the presidential campaign could be witness tampering, a Harvard law professor told LawNewz on Tuesday.
Prof. Laurence Tribe, a known critic of Trump, explained how the president's action is different from other cases where a politician tried to twist the facts or outright lie.
"Not every politician, not by a long shot, is under a DOJ investigation that involves a son (and son-in-law) also under DOJ investigation when the politician concocts a lie for his son," Tribe said.
The professor added that when Trump reportedly gave his son the draft, he knew Donald Jr. "will have to testify under oath to a highly incriminating meeting with a foreign adversary, to use in deflecting attention from suspected collusion with that adversary to tilt the U.S. presidential election in the politician's direction."
Tribe said according to federal law, witness tampering includes instances when someone "corruptly persuades another person … to influence, delay, or prevent the testimony of any person in an official proceeding" and stressed that the law specifies that there doesn't have to be an official proceeding going on at the time.
In addition, the professor said just the idea that Trump made such an effort to instruct his son to not give the entire truth is evidence that he's guilty of something.
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