President Donald Trump signed off on the first vague statement his son gave to The New York Times regarding a meeting last year with a Russian lawyer, the newspaper reported.
That first attempt by the Trumps to make the story go away instead culminated Tuesday in Donald Trump Jr. releasing the entire email exchange on Twitter that indicated his belief he was meeting Natalia Veselnitskaya for the purpose of getting dirt on Hillary Clinton.
Put another way, Trump Jr. thought he was going to get help from the Russians with their campaign.
Though no such information was discussed and Veselnitskaya allegedly misrepresented who she was and her true intentions, the episode has served to only increase the scrutiny and blowback on a topic President Trump wants to make go away.
Further, it possibly has ensnared Trump's son-in-law Jared Kushner, a senior adviser in the White House who also attended the meeting with Veselnitskaya, but failed to cite it on his background check to obtain his security clearance, The Times reported.
Since discovering the emails, Kushner's legal team amended his clearance forms to include the meeting with Veselnitskaya, The Times reported.
The Trump Jr. episode also has put strain on the president's staff and inner circle, with family members lobbying the president to replace chief of staff Reince Priebus, allegedly the preferred fall guy for allowing Trump Jr. to stray into the crosshairs, both the Times and The Washington Post reported.
Trump and his team of private lawyers — helmed by Marc Kasowitz — also are at odds over how the president operates during the ongoing Russia story, often keeping the lawyers out of the loop, The Times reported.
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