US Attorney General quits Russian Federation probe

U.S. President Trump used similar language in a Twitter post Thursday about the attacks on Mr. Sessions, who top Democrats have called on to resign over meeting as a senator previous year with Mr. Kislyak.

Grassley has replied to say he has no plans for such hearing.

But with United States intelligence agencies, the Department of Justice, and four Congressional committees examining the Russian Federation scandal, Democrats demanded that Sessions recuse himself from the investigations and for Congress to name an independent special investigator to oversee a broad probe.

Sessions met with Kislyak twice, in July on the sidelines of the Republican convention, and in September in his office when Sessions was a member of the Senate Armed Services committee.

During the Senate confirmation process to become attorney general, Sessions denied contact with Russian officials during the campaign.

Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said Wednesday night that if the Federal Bureau of Investigation determines Trump’s campaign illegally coordinated with Russia, Sessions should recuse himself from making the decision whether to pursue prosecutions.

He has hit back at congressional Democrats over their meetings with high-profile Russians following Democratic Party criticism of Attorney General Jeff Sessions over his failure to acknowledge his own meetings.

Here’s an interesting tidbit from a State Department cable released by WikiLeaks: after meetings with a handful of Russian officials in 2007, including Kislyak, an Israeli official came away with the view that “Russia hates the USA, wants to become an empire again, and feels empowered because of its oil”.

“If he himself is a subject of an investigation, of course he should (recuse himself.) But if he’s not I don’t see any objective or reason for doing this”, Ryan told reporters Thursday.

“My answer was honest and correct as I understood it”, Sessions said at a Thursday news conference, promising to send a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee to “explain this comment for the record”.

Earlier Thursday, Sessions recused himself from any existing or future probes related to any campaigns for president. Reporter: “Mr. President, do you still have confidence in the Attorney General, sir?”

Mr Peskov argued it was normal for an ambassador to meet with officials and politicians, adding that “the more such meetings an ambassador has, the more efficient his work is”.

Due to viable concerns that he lied during his nomination hearing, Sessions is now the center of suspicions that Russian Federation interfered in the 2016 election.

Mr Sessions is the second Trump administration official to face tough questions about his contact with Mr Kislyak. “He could have stated his response more accurately, but it was clearly not intentional”, Trump said, during a series of tweets.

During the meeting, Gordon told Kislyak he would like to improve relations with Russian Federation, he said, adding that no inappropriate discussion about Russian Federation helping Trump’s campaign occurred, USA Today reported.

Before Trump took office, USA intelligence agencies concluded that Russian Federation had sought to influence the campaign, including by hacking into and leaking Democratic emails. Although he was then-Senator from Alabama, Sessions served as Trump’s top foreign policy advisor at the time of the meetings.

National Security Adviser Michael Flynn resigned February 13, after the disclosure that he had misled administration officials, including the vice president, about his own conversations with the Russian envoy.

Page previously denied having any contact with Russian officials during the 2016 campaign in February. “When the (intelligence community) does that type of comprehensive review, it is standard practice that a significant amount of information would be compiled and documented”.