Kushner just threw Donald Trump Jr. under the bus.

[wvit1001]

Here is what Kushner's statement says about the meeting:

"In June 2016, my brother-in-law, Donald Trump Jr. asked if I was free to stop by a meeting on June 9 at 3:00 p.m. The campaign was headquartered in the same building as his office in Trump Tower, and it was common for each of us to swing by the other's meetings when requested. He eventually sent me his own email changing the time of the meeting to 4:00 p.m. That email was on top of a long back and forth that I did not read at the time. As I did with most emails when I was working remotely, I quickly reviewed on my iPhone the relevant message that the meeting would occur at 4:00 PM at his office. Documents confirm my memory that this was calendared as "Meeting: Don Jr.| Jared Kushner." No one else was mentioned.

"I arrived at the meeting a little late. When I got there, the person who has since been identified as a Russian attorney was talking about the issue of a ban on U.S. adoptions of Russian children. I had no idea why that topic was being raised and quickly determined that my time was not well-spent at this meeting. Reviewing emails recently confirmed my memory that the meeting was a waste of our time and that, in looking for a polite way to leave and get back to my work, I actually emailed an assistant from the meeting after I had been there for ten or so minutes and wrote "Can u pls call me on my cell? Need excuse to get out of meeting."

"I had not met the attorney before the meeting nor spoken with her since. I thought nothing more of this short meeting until it came to my attention recently. I did not read or recall this email exchange before it was shown to me by my lawyers when reviewing documents for submission to the committees. No part of the meeting I attended included anything about the campaign, there was no follow up to the meeting that I am aware of, I do not recall how many people were there (or their names), and I have no knowledge of any documents being offered or accepted. Finally, after seeing the email, I disclosed this meeting prior to it being reported in the press on a supplement to my security clearance form, even if that was not required as meeting the definitions of the form."

It's not entirely clear that the "long back and forth" that Kushner claims he "did not read at the time" is the email chain that Trump Jr. released, under duress, which demonstrated that the meeting was taken with the express purpose of getting information advertised as coming from the Russian government. But it seems clear that this is what he is referring to. Note that Kushner does not say one way or the other whether he had been sent this email chain before. What we do know, however, is that Kushner says he never read it. And if Kushner is to be believed, he agreed to, and showed up at, this meeting without having any idea why it was being held.

This, even though Trump Jr. was quite excited about what this meeting might yield ("I love it," Trump Jr. exulted in the email chain), and even though Trump's then-campaign chair Paul Manafort was also present. This was a meeting attended by Trump's top brain trust, on the expectation that it would yield greatly damaging information about Trump's opponent, just as the campaign was shifting into general election mode - but Kushner was unaware of its purpose.

Also note the exceptional care that went into Kushner's characterization of the meeting. He claims he arrived just late enough to miss the incriminating part of the meeting. Trump Jr. admitted in his second statement that the Russian lawyer brought up the campaign (after an initial statement claiming the meeting was just about Russian adoptions):

Kushner's statement does not deny outright either that the meeting did address the campaign or that any documents had been offered to the Trump camp, which the email chain appears to confirm. All it does is insulate Kushner from those facts.

Kushner's statement denies any collusion on his own part, and claims no awareness of any other collusion:

"I did not collude, nor know of anyone else in the campaign who colluded, with any foreign government."

Of course, what Trump Jr.'s email chain showed is that the campaign jumped at the chance to collude, even if it ended up not happening at that meeting. Recall that Trump Jr.'s original statement covered up the real reason for the meeting, and that President Trump himself reportedly signed off on that initial false statement, which means the president actively participated in an effort to mislead the country about his own campaign's eagerness to collude with Russia to help him win. Kushner's statement offers nothing to challenge these underlying facts. It just separates him from them.


http://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Jared-Kushner-just-threw-Donald-Trump-Jr-under-11338310.php

[wvit1001]

The Princeling has managed to throw the Dauphin under the oxcart fairly convincingly. I love this bunch. They would sell their siblings for a zoning variance. This, by far, is my favorite passage from the Jared Kushner Declaration of Guileless Stupidity. From CNN:

In June 2016, my brother-in-law, Donald Trump Jr. asked if I was free to stop by a meeting on June 9 at 3:00 p.m. The campaign was headquartered in the same building as his office in Trump Tower, and it was common for each of us to swing by the other's meetings when requested. He eventually sent me his own email changing the time of the meeting to 4:00 p.m. That email was on top of a long back and forth that I did not read at the time. As I did with most emails when I was working remotely, I quickly reviewed on my iPhone the relevant message that the meeting would occur at 4:00 PM at his office. Documents confirm my memory that this was calendared as "Meeting: Don Jr.| Jared Kushner." No one else was mentioned.


There's so much ducking and dodging and weaving and blame-shifting in that one section that you can see how young Jared became so favored within the Trump inner circle. The ability to cram such sheer connivance into every sentence must have been what first attracted Trump to his son-in-law. I suspect that the president* is secretly chuckling at how deftly Kushner sold out the president*'s own flesh and blood. In fact, I suspect Pops positively reveled in what Kushner did. Suck it up, Junior. Deal or die. Being a Trump spalpeen must be like being born into a family of Sand Tiger Sharks, where you have to cannibalize your siblings in order to survive.


And so, mad props to The Guardian for dropping this little pearl into the general festering Monday morning. It remains all about the money, and the symbiosis between the needs of the Trump ego and the alleged desire of Russian gangstercrats to clean money, a symbiosis that has succeeded beyond everyone's wildest dreams.

A Guardian investigation has established a series of overlapping ties and relationships involving alleged Russian money laundering, New York real estate deals and members of Trump's inner circle. They include a 2015 sale of part of the old New York Times building in Manhattan involving Kushner and a billionaire real estate tycoon and diamond mogul, Lev Leviev. Leviev, a global tycoon known as the "king of diamonds", was a business partner of the Russian-owned company Prevezon Holdings that was at the center of a multimillion-dollar lawsuit launched in New York. Under the leadership of US attorney Preet Bharara, who was fired by Trump in March, prosecutors pursued Prevezon for allegedly attempting to use Manhattan real estate deals to launder money stolen from the Russian treasury. The scam had been uncovered by Sergei Magnitsky, an accountant who died in 2009 in a Moscow jail in suspicious circumstances. US sanctions against Russia imposed after Magnitsky's death were a central topic of conversation at the notorious Trump Tower meeting last June between Kushner, Donald Trump Jr, Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and a Russian lawyer with ties to the Kremlin.




http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a56534/jared-kushner-statement/

[warrenpees]

Kusher is the one who is vulnerable to perjury charges due to lying on his security clearance application.

[Dan]

No he didn't

[warrenpees]

Did too.  Infinity.

[caserio1]

the free wheeling law ignoring practice of free enterprize

does not mesh well with the

constrictiveness of governments adherance to law and order

[Dan]

Did not - infinity plus one. 

[WWV10MHZ]

Fake News with a Trump-hating slant.