enforcement, it has come under scrutiny for its ties to russians and massive support of trump in 2016. one russian, maria butina. she pleaded guilty to engaging in a conspiracy against the u.s. as part of her deal, she admitted she tried to build relationships with nra members as a way to infiltrate republican political circles and influence u.s. relations with russia. she worked at the behest of a former russian banker and lifetime nra member who was sanctioned by the u.s. last year. years prior to her arrest, butina managed to ask trump about his views on russia at a political event. if you elected as president, what would be your foreign politics in relationship with my country? i believe i would get along very nicely with putin. okay? reporter: despite trump s prior support for a ban on assault weapons, he became a
robert mueller s investigation. a former trump campaign aide tells cnn that when he was interviewed, mueller s team expressed relationship with trump campaign s relationship with the nra. let s get more. gloria, what are the main concerns about a trump nra relationship? first of all, i think that what bob mueller is interested in is finding out a little bit more about the nra s ties to russian nationals. we know that maria butina, who tried to get in with the nra and cultivated relationships there, has now pled guilty essentially to being an operative on behalf of the russians. we know that the nra has raised $30 million on behalf of the trump campaign. we know that the then candidate trump spoke to the nra in 2015 when he was running for office.
regardless of when that deal ended, at a time when donald trump was running for president, he was negotiating or attempting to negotiate a deal that according to the special counsel would have made him hundreds of millions of dollars. that would have been the most lucrative deal donald trump ever made. at the same time, during the same campaign, while he is denying these discussions are taking place, he is advocating relief from sanctions on russia that would make putin billions and russia billions. that is a staggering conflict of interest. for anyone else, it would be catastroph catastrophic. it ought to be catastrophic for this president as well. before i let you go, i want to get you to respond to something that the president s son donald trump junior accused you of last night. listen to this. 8:00 at night looking and cnn is running quotes about my testimony. in the house intelligence
putin s talking points. he is calling for hacked e-mails to be release ereleased. he is speaking in the first person, quoting the president, going on from the day i announced to the day i won, that would be november 2016, not just through the summer, but all the way until the election. he is saying this is what the president said to him. you also have the president s attorneys, who have done written answers to bob mueller, and you don t know whether their written answers actually mesh with what giuliani is now saying. i think that s a headache for them. let me just say one thing about giuliani. people at the white house may think he is doing a lousy job. there s one person at the white house that matters. that s donald trump. that s true. donald trump trusts rudy giuliani. he likes him. he thinks he is out there fighting for him, no matter what he says. if he stirs the pot and creates chaos who thrives in chaos?
to me, it adds to the growing body of evidence that this president is attempting to obstruct justice. giuliani has reversed course and denied president trump was involved in trump tower moscow discussions all the way through election day, november 2016. is giuliani having trouble getting his story straight? do you see a specific strategy behind all of his conflicting comments? honestly, i think at the root of this is a president who keeps changing his story. you had giuliani saying that essentially trump had told him that his talks on the moscow trump tower deal went from the beginning to the end of the campaign. either that was true or it wasn t true. if that is true, it may well be the president came down on him and said, why did you say that? you need to clean that up. now giuliani is saying that what he said was concrete is now hypothetical. let s not lose sight of this fact.