Donald Trump Jr. Ties With Russia News: Secret Service Denies Allowing the Meeting With Russian Lawyer
The United States Secret Service (USSS) has denied that they had any knowledge of and permitted Donald Trump Jr.'s meeting with Russian lawyer Natalia Veselnitskaya.
Recently, Trump Jr. released a thread of his emails on Twitter that contained a conversation about meeting up with Veselnitskaya, who claimed to have incriminating information about former presidential candidate Hilary Clinton.
Jay Sekulow, a member of President Donald Trump's legal team, appeared on ABC's "This Week" last Sunday, July 16, and tried to remove the public's doubt on the first son's meeting with Veselnitskaya by saying that it was approved by the USSS.
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"Well, I wonder why the Secret Service, if this was nefarious, why the Secret Service allowed these people in. The president had Secret Service protection at this point, and that raised a question with me," said Sekulow.
However, USSS spokesman Mason Brayman has denied Sekulow's comments about permitting the said meeting with the Russian representative in an email response to Reuters. Brayman also revealed that Trump Jr. was not under their protection yet when the meeting occurred.
"Donald Trump, Jr. was not a protectee of the USSS in June, 2016. Thus we would not have screened anyone he was meeting with at that time," he said.
There has been a lot of negative feedback on Sekulow's statement involving the USSS.
Frances Townsend, who was an advisor to former President George W. Bush, shared on Twitter, "Ok let's try to deflect blame & throw those in @SecretService who protect @POTUS @realDonaldTrump @FLOTUS & family under the bus."
Moscow continues to deny that they influenced presidential election last year in favor of Trump, while Trump Jr. maintains that he did not collude with the Russians.
Meanwhile, the president continues to defend his son on social media. His latest post on the matter reads, "Most politicians would have gone to a meeting like the one Don jr attended in order to get info on an opponent. That's politics!"
It appears that the U.S. president has changed his defense from emphasizing that Trump Jr. was a transparent and honest man to saying that colluding to get information on your opponent is normal in politics.
