Trump and Putin, behind the scenes

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The famous Trump tower meeting with Don Jr., Kushner and Manafort with Russians about dirt on Hillary, the complete story so far:

Still, there are two more Goldstone emails sent after the meeting that also fit awkwardly with the “such a nothing” scenario. In the first, he says a story on Russia hacking the DNC was “eerily weird” considering what they had just discussed at Trump Tower. In the second, he says that at the meeting, he said a contact of his working at a Russian social media site could set up a page for Trump and “Paul had said he would welcome it.”

These point to two possible topics of further discussion at the meeting — Russian hacking and Russian social media help for Trump — that could have implications with regards to collusion.
Finally, President Trump’s personal involvement in dictating his son’s misleading story that the meeting was about Russian adoptions and not Russian government dirt on Clinton is eyebrow-raising. Here’s how the New York Times describes what happened aboard Air Force One last July:

The president supervised the writing of the statement, according to three people familiar with the episode, with input from other White House aides. A fierce debate erupted over how much information the news release should include. Mr. Trump was insistent about including language that the meeting was about Russian adoptions, according to two people with knowledge of the discussion.

And here’s how Michael Wolff recounted the Air Force One deliberations in his book Fire and Fury:

An aggrieved, unyielding, and threatening president dominated the discussion, pushing into line his daughter and her husband, [Hope] Hicks, and [Josh] Raffel. [Marc] Kasowitz — the lawyer whose specific job was to keep Trump at arm’s length from Russian-related matters — was kept on hold on the phone for an hour and then not put through. The president insisted that the meeting in Trump Tower was purely and simply about Russian adoption policy. That’s what was discussed, period. Period.

Trump’s preferred story was soon debunked, but the question remains why he was so insistent on putting it out in the first place, especially because he wasn’t at the meeting and claims to know little about it. Was he just trying to cover himself politically? Or is there another reason?

Trump Russia news: Mueller investigation focused on Trump Tower meeting - Vox

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