Tim Kaine: Don Jr.’s Meeting Has Moved The Russia Probe ‘Beyond’ Obstruction To ‘Potentially Treason’

The plot thickens on both the unfurling narrative of the Senate Investigative Committee’s probe into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia and the details we have about Russia’s machinations to interfere with the U.S. presidential election. Senator Tim Kaine, Hillary Clinton’s former running mate, stepped forward Tuesday to describe what recent revelations about Donald Trump Jr.’s meeting with a Russian lawyer boil down to. He said to reporters, “We’re now beyond obstruction of justice in terms of what’s being investigated. This is moving into perjury, false statements and even potentially treason.”

Donald Trump Jr., his brother-in-law Jared Kushner, and Donald Trump Sr.’s campaign manager Paul Manafort met with Natalia Veselnitskaya before the election at Trump Tower. The Trump camp first said the meeting was limited to discussing the Magnitsky Act, which currently bars Americans from adopting Russian children. But other sources indicate that Don Jr. was motivated to take the meeting not by a concern for luckless orphans, but because he was promised “damaging information” about Hillary Clinton. Ironically, the revelation about Don Jr.’s meeting with Veselnitskaya, whose husband is a Russian politician and who herself has been subject to an FBI investigation, came about from an email about the meeting.

Kaine’s assessment — which is likely exaggerated in terms of “treason” — of how this will impact the Senate’s investigation is not an uncommon one. At the very least, many on Capitol Hill agree that the meeting looks suspicious and does the Trump family no favors.

Donald Trump Jr. has taken a page from his father’s book by taking to Twitter to defend himself, even including screencaps of the emails in question in an effort to be “totally transparent.” He also said that this new attention on his meeting with Veselnitskaya smacks of desperation from the left, and that the liberals pursuing the matter are motivated solely by a desire to see Trump fail.

This is the second time recently Donald Trump Jr. has been in the spotlight. Late last week, he was tweeting in defense of Ivanka’s participation as a presidential proxy in a G20 Summit meeting, telling haters she is “out of your league.” He also suggested that if liberals are upset about Ivanka’s role in the Summit, they would be even more rankled if it were he, rather than Ivanka, acting as his father’s Girl Friday. He might have gotten his wish to play that right hand role now that the Senate is looking into his meeting with a Russian attorney.

(Via The Hill)

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