Jeff Sessions Met With Russian Ambassador the Same Day Trump Gave Interview to Russian Television
With revelations that Attorney General Jeff Sessions met, on multiple occasions, with Russia’s ambassador to the United States, Sergey Kislyak, President Donald Trump can be all but certain that questions surrounding his administration’s ties to Russia will remain.
As Dafna Linzer, Managing Editor for politics at NBC News & MSNBC, pointed out on Twitter, then-candidate Donald Trump gave an interview on Russian television the same day Sessions met with the ambassador — September 8.
While it doesn’t necessarily suggest anything untoward, the coincidence is a highly unfortunate one for the new president.
Trump was interviewed by Russian goverment TV the day Sessions met Kislyek: https://t.co/sHQiGwX2oQ
— Dafna Linzer (@DafnaLinzer) March 2, 2017
Trump appeared on a September 8, episode of the RT show, Politicking, hosted by his friend and former CNN anchor Larry King. He was previously interviewed by King on the same program in 2013. RT, a Kremlin-backed Russian media outlet, is well-known as a front for Russian propaganda.
During his January 10 confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sessions told Democrat Al Franken (MN), “I have been called a surrogate at a time or two in that campaign and I did not have communications with the Russians.”
In remarks to NBC earlier today Sessions clarified that he had “not met with any Russians at any time to discuss any political campaign.” The Attorney General added that he would consider recusing himself from any Department of Justice investigation into Russian election meddling.
(And for anyone keeping score, September 8, 2016 was also a consequential day for Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson who asked his now infamous question, “What is Aleppo?”)
[image via screengrab]
