Trump defends son’s meeting with Russian lawyer: “Most people would have taken that meeting” https://t.co/3j8vQFZXIB https://t.co/g6LO2WSVbG
— CNN (@CNN) July 13, 2017
On Wednesday, President Trump defended the actions of eldest son Don Jr during an interview in the Oval Office: “I think many people would have held that meeting.” On Thursday, the president traveled to France to attend a Bastille Day Parade and, during a joint news conference with French President Emanuel Macron, doubled down on his opinion that many people would have done what his son did.
Trump said that it was “very standard” for his son to meet with a Kremlin-connected lawyer who he believed promised “damaging” information about his father’s political opponent:
“Politics is not the nicest business in the world, but it’s very standard, where they have information and you take information … I think from a practical standpoint most people would have taken that meeting. It’s called opposition research, or even ‘research into your opponent. I think the press made a very big deal over something that really a lot of people would do.”
Trump also stated that the length of the meeting itself was a sign that it wasn’t that big of a deal. “It was a short meeting. It was a meeting that went very quickly, very fast.”
However, the meeting wasn’t productive, Trump said. “Nothing happened from the meeting, zero happened from the meeting.”
To round out his defense of his son, Trump reached for an old classic: blaming the Obama administration.
“Somebody said that her visa or her passport to come into the country was approved by Attorney General Lynch,” Trump said. “Now, maybe that’s wrong, I just heard that a little while ago. That’s why she was here, because of Lynch.”