Heartbroken Russian Ambassador Thought Special Meetings With Jeff Sessions Were Very Memorable

On Tuesday evening, The New York Times released a report stating that the Obama administration “scrambled” to preserve evidence of Russian attempts to influence the election (and possible Trump campaign collusion) in the final days of Barack Obama’s presidency.

“I have never been told that”, Sessions said.

And they fed mounting calls for Sessions to recuse himself from oversight of Justice Department and Federal Bureau of Investigation probes into the alleged Russian meddling and contacts with Trump campaign advisers.

The president on Friday tweeted a photo of the two men, calling for a probe into Schumer’s “ties to Russian Federation and Putin” and called the NY senator “A total hypocrite!”

“I have come to the reluctant conclusion that the Attorney General should step down”, he said, echoing calls made earlier by top Democrats in both chambers of the Republican-controlled Congress.

“This conversation yesterday with the president was focused primarily on tax relief and health care – repealing and replacing Obamacare”, he said.

“There must be an independent, bipartisan, outside commission to investigate the full extent of the Trump political, personal and financial connections to the Russians”, she said. Al Franken (D-Minn.) during his confirmation hearing whether he had any contact with Russian officials while citing reports of interference in the presidential election.

On Thursday, Sessions recused himself from any current or future investigations involving campaigns for president, but maintained he answered questions at his confirmation “honest and correct as I understood at the time”. Trump said in a statement.

A White House official informed Foreign Policy that Hill was offered the job, and considered it to be one of the most important positions within the government shaping the United States’ relationship with Russian Federation, alongside Keith Kellogg, who happened to be the one who wanted to bring her in.

But Sessions did not disclose his meetings with the Russian envoy despite being asked about it specifically.

The other encounter was in July during the Republican National Convention, at a Heritage Foundation event attended by as many as 50 ambassadors.

Also in on the meeting was Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn, who stepped down as national security advisor after revelations about his contacts with Kislyak as Trump prepared to take office. But that requires Sessions knowingly saying something false or misleading; if he simply forgot, it doesn’t qualify as perjury. The highest ranking Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, which is conducting one of the probes, has accused F.B.I.

Rep. Sean DuffySean DuffyGOP rep: Sessions should have been “more clear” about meetings Sessions willing to recuse himself from Russian Federation investigation Juan Williams: Can Congress curb Trump? Democrats went further and called for his resignation and the appointment of a special prosecutor. They said that since I had involvement with the campaign, I should not be involved in any campaign investigation.

McCaskill spokeswoman Sarah Feldman said McCaskill’s interactions with Kislyak were materially different than Sessions’.

The Trump administration denied for months, though, that there had been contact between anyone in the campaign and Russian officials.

It has since emerged that he met the Russian ambassador to the US, Sergey Kislyak, twice in 2016.

While Republicans have largely held off on calling for Sessions’ resignation, several have said he needs to recuse himself from the Russian Federation investigation. Ties with Russian Federation have been deeply strained in recent years over Moscow’s military interference in Ukraine, military support for President Bashar al-Assad in Syria and President Vladimir Putin’s intolerance of political dissent.

With his administration on the defensive over Russia, Trump’s enthusiasm seems to have cooled, and his top foreign policy advisers have begun talking tougher about Moscow.

Sessions’ announcement that he would recuse himself was plainly meant to defuse a controversy that looked increasingly unsafe for the Trump administration, but in several ways, all it did was to refocus the questions that will be brought up by political opponents and even concerned allies.