WASHINGTON _ President Donald Trump offered praise for his "high quality" son in his first remarks on Donald Trump Jr. in the four days that the younger man has been at the center of a media storm for his meeting with a Russian lawyer during last year's campaign.
In saluting his son for transparency, Trump was alluding to Donald Jr.'s release hours earlier of an email exchange on his June 9, 2016, meeting with the lawyer _ emails that the son disclosed only after he'd learned from The New York Times that it was about to publish them.
The chain of emails began with a message from Rob Goldstone, a music promoter with business dealings in Russia who is a friend of Trump Jr.'s. Goldstone offered to set up a meeting with a Russian government attorney who had "official documents and information" that would "incriminate" Hillary Clinton "and be very useful to your father."
Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and campaign chairman, Paul Manafort, were also copied on some of the messages, showing for the first time that Trump Jr., Kushner and Manafort likely understood going into the meeting that the lawyer had incriminating information on the Clinton campaign that was part of a broader Russian government effort to help the Trump campaign.
As such, the exchange suggests the most incriminating evidence to date that the Trump campaign coordinated with Russia to try to hurt the Clinton campaign, a matter that is now the subject of investigation by a Justice Department special counsel and House and Senate committees.
Rather than turn to Twitter as he often does, or speak to the news media, the president issued the statement lauding his son through spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders. She read it at the start of an off-camera briefing for White House reporters Tuesday afternoon.
Sanders referred questions on what Trump knew about Trump Jr.'s contact with the Russian attorney to outside lawyers for the president and Trump Jr.
In Monday's briefing, Sanders said the president learned about Trump Jr.'s meeting "in the last couple days." When asked Tuesday if she has learned anything in the last 24 hours that would change that answer, she said, "No, I haven't" and ended the briefing after 19 minutes.
