Testify before Senate

Russian lawyer who met with Trump Jr. offers to testify before Senate

By LOUIS NELSON

The Russian attorney whose meeting last summer with Donald Trump Jr. created a fresh wave of speculation surrounding the possibility of collusion between the Kremlin and the campaign of President Donald Trump has offered to testify before the Senate.

"I'm ready to clarify the situation behind this mass hysteria – but only through lawyers or testifying in the Senate," Natalia Veselnitskaya told Russian government-owned television network RT, according to a Reuters report published Wednesday.

Veselnitskaya met in June 2016, with Trump Jr., in a meeting also attended by the president’s then-campaign chairman Paul Manafort and top adviser Jared Kushner. In setting up the meeting, Trump Jr. was told that Veselnitskaya was in possession of damaging information, sourced from the Russian government, on Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

Upon hearing what Veselnitskaya could apparently offer, Trump Jr. wrote that “if it’s what you say, I love it, especially later in the summer.” The emails between the president’s son and the intermediary setting up the meeting with Veselnitskaya are the strongest evidence yet that at least some within the Trump campaign may have been aware of the Russian government’s efforts to aid their candidate.

Trump Jr., who first denied that the meeting had been advertised with incriminating information about Clinton, later conceded that that was what he had been offered but that Veselnitskaya ultimately had no such information. He has tried to downplay the meeting but has admitted that he "probably would have done things a little differently" given the chance.

Veselnitskaya has denied having any ties to the Russian government and has said she never possessed any information on Clinton.