Say about this controversy after the sort of the statement after statement that changed the story a little bit on donald trump jr. s meeting with this russian lawyer. He basically said my son is a high quality individual, hes been transparent and open. Hes come out and given the whole story. But there are a lot of questions that still remain and in the white house i think theyre very well aware these are not questions that are going to go away and theyre not questions that theyre prepared to take. Theres a lot of legal jeopardy around this meeting. Theres a question of whether the president himself knew about it. Of course we heard donald trump jr. Say in the interview last night that he had not discussed it with his father. But that is going to really hamstring their ability to get ahead of this story. I think there are a lot of questions about what more the president can say without getting a little too close to what is really one of the more damaging revelations of the last few week
to ask them to answer it. you said he did not dictate. the lawyers said he did. what is it? i can onlyespond t er from theresident s outside counsel. we purposely walled off and i would refer you to them for comment. matt apuzzo us s the back story and don junior has been caught lying in his testimony bec he was also asked about the crafting of that statement. give us a little back story on what sarah was being pressed on and why. so, obviously last july, as my colleagues and i were kind of putting the finishing touches on this story, revealed the trump tower meeting had happened. we of course went tthe white house. we went to donald trump, jr., and went to everybody and asked for statements and we got a comment from donald trump, jr. through his lawyer that said, you know, this was basically a nothing meeting. it was mostly about russian adoption policy. basically pay it no mi and then of course we found out
it was a meeting apparently about russian adoption. and after about 20 minutes, the meeting ended and that was the end of it. i don t know much about it other than it seems to be on the end of the trump individuals a big nothing burger. all right. you were not on the air force one when that statement was dictated. no. we now learned the next day that it was not about russian adoptions at the initial meeting. we have the e-mails from donald trump jr. who told you who told you the adoption story? that s what i ve always heard. i mean, i heard that from from members of the family. i heard that it was a nothing meeting. so when you were preparing to go on that show and you asked what should i know about this meeting, members of the family told you russian adoption? that s all i ever heard that it was about. in fact, i still believe what i said in that clip in that, in fact, it was a meeting about russian adoption and this thing called the magnitsky act that i ve never heard
responsible people would even accept such a meeting given the stated purpose in the e-mail. the counter is these happen all the time. everybody wants to help. it was a nothing meeting. nothing came out of it. is that good enough? not in this context. look, in a campaign in a transition it is not unusual for an ambassador to reach out for relationship building purposes. and it would not be unusual for somebody to take the meeting, nod your head, be polite, say thank you very much for your interest to something of that nature. but my recollection of the intended purpose of the meeting was to get dirt on hillary clinton. that is very, very different. and as i said, federal campaigns are not supposed to be accepting assistance from foreign citizens and foreign governments. so it is very troubling. and i m sure mr. mueller is investigating it. have you ever heard of anything like what s coming out of this michael wolff book about
it is a complete bogus and nonsensical thing. the kid took a nothing meeting. reince priebus called it a nothing burger. since that s been overused. would i taken that meeting? i m not sure. white house communications director anthony scaramucci calling the president s 39-year-old soon kid, and the russia probe completely bogus. tonight, the washington post is reporting that scaramucci may be pushing a staff purge at the white house. quote, he is meeting one on one with aides in an effort to understand each person s contradictio contributions. that s within the communications shop. scaramucci s planned overhaul is likely to leave priebus more